5 ms·

This seems like a luddite's argument. Automation tends to make things less expensive, and automation hasn't lead to economic crisis' in the past That's like sa

by Jalad 4y ago

This seems like a luddite's argument. Automation tends to make things less expensive, and automation hasn't lead to economic crisis' in the past That's like saying computers are going to destroy a lot of jobs and cause an economic crisis, when in reality the opposite happened

croes 4y ago
So why was it necessary to shift production to China? Automation tended to kill blue collar jobs, and if you don't have job even cheap is expensive. The next wave of automation will kill the higher value jobs too.
- adventured 4y ago
  > So why was it necessary to shift production to China? It wasn't necessary. You're conflating necessary with desirable. The gap between the two is an increased profit margin, which is desirable for most corporations. Further, the CCP is becoming both dramatically more hostile to business in general and more dangerous as a foe to liberal, democratic nations (including Taiwan most prominently), while simultaneously the financial cost of operating in China has continued to climb by the year (which is a trend that is unlikely to significantly reverse). The China discount for offshoring isn't nearly what it was 15-20 years ago. The disaster that Russia is causing in Europe is a small hint of what China might cause in Asia in the coming decades. Russia's perceived capabilities weren't nearly what the West thought they were; China's military capabilities are more likely to exceed our expectations (in recent history China has more commonly followed the path of hide your strength and bide your time, as opposed to Russia's vacuous boasting), and it's backed up by a gigantic economy with manufacturing that Russia could only dream of.
  - baybal2 4y ago
    [dead]
filmgirlcw 4y ago
And a lot of automation in manufacturing doesn’t negate the need for human labor anyway. It’s still faster, more efficient, and better QA in many cases to have humans assemble certain things than to use machines. That won’t be the case forever, but the level that people think that the automation is going to be superior or even faster than the human element is often forgotten. I agree with you that automation doesn’t necessarily lead to a loss of jobs. It can create opportunities for whole new skills and job types. The struggle has been, especially in the US, that we haven’t then properly prepared or skilled people to do the new wave of jobs that can’t be automated. I always think of this article [1] from January 2017: > When the German engineering company Siemens Energy opened a gas turbine production plant in Charlotte, N.C., some 10,000 people showed up at a job fair for 800 positions. But fewer than 15 percent of the applicants were able to pass a reading, writing and math screening test geared toward a ninth-grade education. So out of 10,000 applicants, less than 1500 were even qualified to interview for a job, of which they only had 800 positions. That’s a problem but the solution isn’t to shun automation. [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/education/edlife/factory-workers-college-degree-apprenticeships.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/education/edlife/factory-...

by Jalad 4y ago

croes 4y ago

So why was it necessary to shift production to China? Automation tended to kill blue collar jobs, and if you don't have job even cheap is expensive. The next wave of automation will kill the higher value jobs too.

adventured 4y ago
> So why was it necessary to shift production to China? It wasn't necessary. You're conflating necessary with desirable. The gap between the two is an increased profit margin, which is desirable for most corporations. Further, the CCP is becoming both dramatically more hostile to business in general and more dangerous as a foe to liberal, democratic nations (including Taiwan most prominently), while simultaneously the financial cost of operating in China has continued to climb by the year (which is a trend that is unlikely to significantly reverse). The China discount for offshoring isn't nearly what it was 15-20 years ago. The disaster that Russia is causing in Europe is a small hint of what China might cause in Asia in the coming decades. Russia's perceived capabilities weren't nearly what the West thought they were; China's military capabilities are more likely to exceed our expectations (in recent history China has more commonly followed the path of hide your strength and bide your time, as opposed to Russia's vacuous boasting), and it's backed up by a gigantic economy with manufacturing that Russia could only dream of.
- baybal2 4y ago
  [dead]

filmgirlcw 4y ago

And a lot of automation in manufacturing doesn’t negate the need for human labor anyway. It’s still faster, more efficient, and better QA in many cases to have humans assemble certain things than to use machines. That won’t be the case forever, but the level that people think that the automation is going to be superior or even faster than the human element is often forgotten. I agree with you that automation doesn’t necessarily lead to a loss of jobs. It can create opportunities for whole new skills and job types. The struggle has been, especially in the US, that we haven’t then properly prepared or skilled people to do the new wave of jobs that can’t be automated. I always think of this article [1] from January 2017: > When the German engineering company Siemens Energy opened a gas turbine production plant in Charlotte, N.C., some 10,000 people showed up at a job fair for 800 positions. But fewer than 15 percent of the applicants were able to pass a reading, writing and math screening test geared toward a ninth-grade education. So out of 10,000 applicants, less than 1500 were even qualified to interview for a job, of which they only had 800 positions. That’s a problem but the solution isn’t to shun automation. [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/education/edlife/factory-workers-college-degree-apprenticeships.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/education/edlife/factory-...