I'm not well educated in economic matters, but it seems to me that if businesses pay less and less wages to their workers on a national level, then how will those workers have the money to buy things that keep those businesses going?  Companies save money by keeping employee wages low, but then as every company does this, there is no buying power and business struggles.

The tension is businesses making money but also contributing back to society through fair wages, social responsibility and levering their influence to help. Too little profit, and the business tanks. Too little contribution to society, and the gap between the wealthy and society keeps widening. Both non-profit groups and the government can help to bridge the gap, but only so far.

I think it has to get worse before it gets better. When automation reaches a breaking point where it causes crippling unemployment, and the advantages of owning automation resources amount to paying electric bills instead of wages, society will force owners of automation resources to redistribute their wealth as income to the whole of society.

More socialist institutions are the answer to wealth inequality, and rightly so. When wealth is an incentive toward productivity it is a social good, if you can build wealth without productivity, it is a social ill (congressmen making fortunes on insider trading exemptions is a good example). If you can generate productivity by buying the legacy of genius of society, say by running a factory entirely by robotics, then society as a whole is owed a piece of this pie. Of course, a corporate entity could run what amounts to third-world labor camps in lieu of the factory of robots technology, and this is something which shouldn't be paid for with lobbying/government bribes.

In short, I believe increasing socialism is both the answer and inevitable outcome of technological progress.

Credit, credit, and more credit.  Household debt is at levels that could not have been imagined in the 1950s.

Simply put- the economic model of the 1950s just does not work for modern society with its multinational corporations, reduced American competitive advantage , weaker unionization, and increased automation.   All of those things are vast disadvantages for the non-capital class.

The labor market will fail when the value of most people's labor reaches amounts insufficient for them to live on.

This is pretty ignorant. Businesses contribute to society by making money and selling their product. Apple contributes to society by providing it with Iphones that change the way we live our lives, stores contribute to society by giving us convenient places to shop for the things we need, Stardock provides us with software that makes our lives easier or more entertaining, and tire companies provide us with ever cheaper tires so that the cost of living goes down and every one is richer. Competition in turn ensures that these businesses not only aid society but ensure they are the best possible way to do it.

I like how your example of a failure of capitalism in need of socialism is corrupt government...

Your robot factory example is also very bad. You can't just buy a factory and get free money. You would have to compete with every other factory and that means that you run the risk of losing everything unless you run your factory or company better then your competition which in turn means you provide more to society and all society is better off.

I can see why some people would believe that but it won't happen. Socialism cannot exist outside a economy dominated by manufacturing. All the stats reveal that unions are disappearing as manufacturing is replaced by the much more fluid and innovative information economy. Government regulation and control also has no real part to play in this new economy for similar reasons. The new economy focuses too much on change, risk taking, and innovation for governments to keep up or hope to even understand. All they can do is stifle growth in a hopeless attempt to prevent change. Sure you can have a progressive tax structure and welfare but that's not socialism, and welfare is never to be desired.

Right now the economy is in the process of a transition, similar to that of the Industrial Revolution. Eventually we will see a new equilibrium but not until a lot of jobs disappear and are replaced by new types of jobs which will require a painful transition and large parts of society to be re-trained.

People become more interested in their government as social conditions worsen. Government corruption in this country as it is based almost entirely on capitalist influence. Other examples I could have used are banking/speculation entanglement, and various high-level investment practices (smart, informed gambling where considerable risk is taken on by society at large).

The robot factory is an example that automation is eating jobs, and automation has been earned by the genius of society at large. Full robot factories don't yet exist, they are better approximated by outsourcing practices I mentioned in my original post. Turing, Shannon, and countless researchers who pushed/push computer science forward at universities but get a small, finite compensation for the progress that will continue on forever because of it are the foundation of this legacy of society, and it is generally at government institutions that the cutting-edge common good technology is coming from. Apple is innovating iPhones while artificial intelligence is being pursued by the government and in universities. An iPhone will delight for a year, artificial intelligence will reshape the common good forever.

On the last part of your post, I agree we are in a transition, but automation will create so much wealth that it must be shared. Put it in to the basic needs of people, free higher education, and things that will benefit all. Society can't rely on lop-sided wealth created by owning automation to be put toward the common good.

Of course I might be wrong, but by my definition of contribute is to give without cost. Although, I agree businesses contribute, it is not by making money and selling their product, as these are costs to the society and a sale of a good.

Many business contribute by providing infrastructure to the local community at no cost to the community. Namely, a factory is built and the company updates and builds roads for the community to get the company. This is a contribution.

Another contribution businesses commonly provide for the community is local jobs for the community.

All companies are usually forced to give mandated contributions in terms of taxes to the society, but by and large there are some larger companies that are circumventing these mandated contributions, even with their quite large profit margins.

One part of the contributions to society that leads to a perceived problem is the contribution is given at a world scale and no longer at the local country scale. The switch to automation is a fine innovation, but the companies are faulted not in the automation, it is that their contributions to the local area have decreased as such and this is where things start to become faulty. The investment in the local community is no longer necessary part of making a business successful and as more and more larger companies avoid mandated local contributions, the result is a weaker economy in these areas.

This is not true for all business and many businesses are unable to avoid the mandated contributions, but a company contributing to society by making money and selling their product is not a contribution to society. The contribution is the jobs the company provides and the infrastructure that company creates. As Frogboy puts it, the more automation takes over, the less these companies have to contribute to their local infrastructure to be successful (local work force) and in turn the less contributions that company makes towards the local society.

The way Android and IOS have revolutionized entire industries and changed the way millions of people live their lives proves you wrong.  Entire new business categories have arisen that need to be filled because of the advancements smartphones over the last half decade. These categories are filled by companies which provide jobs and benefits to their employees in order to make whatever it is they make for that business category which, in many cases, either provides joy to individuals or services that allow other businesses to grow, thereby further expanding on the jobs & benefits theme.

Look at Square.  Without IOS Square doesn't exist.  Square has allowed all sorts of new economic activity by removing the barrier to entry for small businesses looking to offer credit card payment options to clients.  None of this is done out of altruism.  It is done for whatever the personal motives are of whatever person/people runs the companies involved. 

Do you think the modern computer or modern medicine, to take two broad examples which have improved billions of lives, reached their current state because of a desire to improve the local community?  

I fail to see how that proves me wrong. The fact of the matter is that this company making money and selling their product contributes to society is false. I did not say that it does not change society and provides a different platform for others to contribute to society. But like I said I might be confused by the definition of contribution which comes at no cost. What cost did the Android and IOS have on the society? Did the companies that developed these products give them to society at no cost, set up the infrastructure to use these products at no cost to society? If I recall correctly, one can obtain the Android OS for free at no cost, and so by my definition that is a contribution, thus your statement doesn't prove me wrong.

I for one have not used an Android or IOS don't have the money to afford that kind of phone. Is my life affected by these products, of course. Same as my life will be affected if a mine was built next to the only major water supply in the world fails to keep the poisons from entering the water. That is a great contribution of the company as it came at no cost to society... but then what do you imply is cost at this point. I was careful to point out that the cost to society must be negligible in order for it to be a contribution. I don't go to the store and say what a great contribution that lawnmower company made to me. I say instead that lawnmower company provided a great product for me to purchase. It was not a contribution to me, it was a contribution to who? who was able to have the item at no cost?

The modern computer did reach their current state to improve the local community. Otherwise what is the impetus for the sale of the item, if it does not improve something why would someone purchase the product? Watch the "God's must be Crazy" and tell me what a modern computer would be to that society, to summarize it would be useless, because they don't know anything about it, nor how to use it. Thus, these companies are forced to contribute to society by educating the populous (much of what Apple did in a lot of public schools).

Medicine on the other hand has a lot of contributions, but who bore the cost of these "contributions" and can you get all this information for free?

For the business side, If they made a drug that only 10 people could afford, then is that a contribution to society, suppose that it cures any ailment without consequence. Under that circumstance, what is the contribution to society?

I am simply curious on what the definition of contribution being used is here. I noticed that you used contribution to society that a business who developed the original framework contributed to society by have other companies contribute to society. That is not the same as the first company directly contributing to society. That would imply that any work done as a derived work of another is that others contribution, but not the one who made the final result. That is akin to suggesting that the car is a contribution of the oil companies.