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Articles about Amazon are quick to mention the workplace conditions or robots automating something. Rarely do they mention that machines equal lower prices for
by elamje 7y ago
Articles about Amazon are quick to mention the workplace conditions or robots automating something. Rarely do they mention that machines equal lower prices for the consumers 9 times out of 10.
You can think what you want about Amazon but I’m not complaining that I have 100’s of options for my phone case, all for 1/5 the price of the previous days buying them at Verizon or Apple.
Edit: would be awesome to hear about Amazon’s pricing practice from an employee
- fxfan 7y agoThank god I can now buy that $70 iPhone case for $69. Who cares what these uneducated people get paid. Also, everything will be fine when we ring socialism so others can pay taxes to subsidies the lives of these uneducated people. Not me though, I want my stuff cheap and my taxes low. /s
- tammer 7y agoI think you are correct in that this is often not brought into such conversations. I also think that the full extent of this conversation, that consumer interest is currently in opposition with our responsibilities as a society, is rarely considered by the mainstream media as well.
- JMTQp8lwXL 7y agoIt seems less relevant to compare the cost of a case at Verizon/Apple than purchasing through Amazon. Why? It's a completely different experience -- you get to see the selection in person, ask questions, try the case on your phone to confirm it actually fits, you know there is near-0 odds of it being a counterfeit or unscrupulous seller (unlike Amazon). The mort apt comparison is the cost of the phone case when packed with human labor vs. packed by robots.
- o_p 7y ago>machines bring lower prices Do you have any source about this? If the costumer is already willing to pay a price there would be no point in lowering the price just because you automated the process. Or better said, theres no point in investing in machines if your profit margin is not going to get wider.
- edanm 7y agoSure there is. If they don't do it, someone else will be able to outcompete on price, eventually at least. And yes, most of our history is full of examples of newer technologies lowering cost, that's kind of the whole reason that or civilization is more advanced (materially) than it was in the past.
- lostphilosopher 7y agoThere's also the "number of purchases * purchase price" equation which means you can make more money by reducing price if it means (enough) more people by the product, or buy more of them.
- nerdponx 7y agoRight now they have no need to lower prices. They can hold their lower production costs as a threat to any competitor who might be tempted to enter a price war, without ever needing to actually lower their prices.
- zwily 7y agoYeah, one of Bezos’ oldest mantras is “Your margin is my opportunity”.
- benatkin 7y agoAmazon has been quite the monopolistic company lately. Just because a company started winning by outdoing the competition doesn't mean that will continue to be their only way of succeeding. Even the most principled companies will adopt a few anticompetitive practices here and there when they get big. I think with Amazon building out their delivery and subscription options, they can hold back a lot of pressure to share the savings from automation with consumers.
- elamje 7y agoBezos also said his top 3 priorities are lower prices, faster delivery, and wider selection.
- 7y ago
- icegreentea2 7y agoLol, I think Americans figured out that whole story already. We've already seen decades of American jobs being slashed to lower costs, with something tacked on about reducing the cost to the consumer.
- KorematsuFred 7y agoAnother advantage is there that the frequent claim that amazon abuses its employees will finally be put to rest as there will be mostly machines doing the work. No workplace abuse is a big win.
- yomly 7y agoWhen you collect as much data as Amazon, you can start attributing incremental worker time spent picking/carrying down to the SKU level. This means that cost of worker time is less for things like books (a picker can carry many and move quickly) while a 60" TV might require two pickers moving slowly. Better attribution of cost means more margin to play with and cost savings that can be pushed onto customers in a fairer sense - especially if your pricing is automated. Interestingly Kiva may then selectively reduce the costs associated with bulky goods as they're probably better at moving big stuff and travel faster/shorter.
- SubiculumCode 7y agoThe problem isn't lower prices, it is lack of money by consumers who lose their jobs. The displacement of retail jobs is massive and really hurting people.