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We don’t have to automate things before the alternative systems are in place to suppprt the millions of people who will need re-schooling. Especially not while
by devjab 2y ago
We don’t have to automate things before the alternative systems are in place to suppprt the millions of people who will need re-schooling. Especially not while the benefits of the automation goes solely to investors and owners. There is also the part where some automation is vulnerable to infrastructure attacks. I don’t know if this apply to dockworkers in particular, but there are some areas we probably shouldn’t be automating.
This is probably where I should point out that I’m Danish, and, left leaning. Which means I’m more “eat the rich” than what most of you will encounter. Somewhat ironically I also worked with digitalisation in the public sector for about a decade, but that’s another story. Anyway, an example of things I really don’t think we should automate is public pool control. We did PoC on that because some bean counter decided we could save something like 5 hours a month if we automated it rather than have one of the janitors (which isn’t the correct work for these people but I simply can’t find the right English word) wouldn’t have to check once a week. The disadvantage of this was that you could remotely alter the chemicals in the pools. These days I work in the green energy industry where you could seriously disrupt a lot of plants and storage by entering through weakly protected inverters by gaining accesses to wholly unnecessary automation. Unnecessary because you already have a lot of greenfield engineers on site or nearby.
Now, I don’t know if dock work is vital infrastructure, but if it is, then automation might be an unnecessary risk.
- wskinner 2y ago> the benefits of the automation goes solely to investors and owners Totally false. The benefits go to anyone who buys or sells goods that pass through the ports.
- viraptor 2y agoOnly if the automation is cheaper and more efficient and that improvement/saving gets passed on to the (un)loading fees and then to the companies doing the transport and then to the marketplace middlemen and then then to the buyers/sellers.
- wskinner 2y agoIt is, and it does. US ports are far less efficient than the more automated ports in Asia and Europe.
- viraptor 2y agoIt's not clear the automation change in isolation would improve the situation. They can get automated badly and be even less efficient.
- Yeul 2y agoAh but that's because Rotterdam competes with Antwerp and Hamburg for example. How many terminals are there on the West coast of the US that can handle the biggest vessels?
- gamblor956 2y agoTwo, and they both make heavy use of automation. (The port of LA and the neighboring port of Long Beach).
- seymore_12 2y agoIn my opinion, port costs never go down with automation. If anything, they go up when automation is deployed (this essentially means unmanned reach stackers, more cranes and eventually new TOS (Terminal Operating System) to compensate investment. This is interesting document (PDF) with port performance index for 2023. Page 11. https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/099060324114539683/pdf/P17583313892300871be641a5ea7b90e0e6.pdf https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/0990603241145396...
- Aerroon 2y agoThe port costs might not go down now, but they also might increase as much as they would otherwise in the future.
- johnnyanmac 2y ago>anyone who buys or sells goods so, not the workers or the larger populace. Just more business that is continuing to make life more expensive. These are all subjective, so this is neither true nor false.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- wskinner 2y agoEveryone buys stuff.
- johnnyanmac 2y agoYes, and buying stuff got worse over the years, not better. The consumer is not benefiting from this to begin with (as if thars an argument to not pay your labor).
- andrewjl 2y agoIt'd be nice right? Too bad the maritime shipping industry is an oligopoly.
- jjav 2y ago> Totally false. The benefits go to anyone who buys or sells goods that pass through the ports. Mostly true. Only if there is huge competitive pressure will the prices be forced to go down. Otherwise, those owners simply make more profit now and keep prices the same. With ports, you don't have much competitive pressure because a competitor can't just another mega-port next to the existing one, there is no such space available.
- wskinner 2y agoIf that is true, then what stops port operators from raising prices from their present level and pocketing the free money? In reality, demand curves slope down and the surplus from efficiency improvements is split between buyers and sellers. And with the lower costs that result from efficiency improvements, ports will be able to move more goods per unit of time. Even with the unrealistic assumption that the surplus is entirely captured by the port operators, buyers and sellers of goods will benefit from the increased volume.
- jjav 2y ago> If that is true, then what stops port operators from raising prices from their present level and pocketing the free money? They do raise prices, gradually. But raising prices is harder because users complain in many ways. Keeping prices the same while reducing your costs (thus improving profits) is much easier, nobody notices.
- soco 2y agoIs this the trickle down argument again? Are there still people around honestly believing it? Even Wikipedia says there's zero proof, but nice to peek at the last century fads once in a while.
- roenxi 2y agoUnlikely because the "trickle down" argument doesn't exist as a positive policy. It is where the opponents of a policy argue that it won't work because the value will accrue to the wealthy. In this case the original argument was that capital investments at the port will create value to the port users. It is likely correct - if the port invests in robots then it is extremely reasonable to expect that users of the port will get cheaper and better service. The port owners might make more money or they might get squeezed by economics, that part is much harder to work out.
- consteval 2y ago> extremely reasonable to expect that users of the port will get cheaper and better service. Better, sure, cheaper? Almost certainly not.
- thrance 2y agoOnly if the dock owners reduce the price of unloading goods, but why would they when they could just pocket the savings from firing everyone? It's not like there is much competition.
- consteval 2y agoYou're operating under the assumption the cost savings are passed onto consumers. I see no reason why this would be the case - the cost savings would do much better as expansion of capital, and consumers are already happy with the current price.
- black_knight 2y agoIt is such a paradox in our society that a shortage of work is a problem! Should we then not relax? After automating a job, the burden of work should lessen on the society as a whole. We should all be resting on laurel leaves, surrounded by our magnificent technology.
- rjbwork 2y agoBut you didn't help create it. People with money did. So you must keep working 40 hours a week while they collect ever increasing sums of money with their capital proceeds. It's capitalism, not laborism, or humanism. Those with the capital are who the system serves.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- black_knight 2y agoAs a human, I think I would like some more humanism in my society.
- ClumsyPilot 2y agoApparently that’s controversial
- honestAbe22 2y ago[dead]
- Aerroon 2y ago>while they collect ever increasing sums of money with their capital proceeds. But in the process of doing so the rest of us benefit from all of the goods and services this capital use created. The economy is not about money, it's about stuff. I would much rather Ozempic exist and make somebody rich rather than it not exist, because there are millions of people that benefit from its existence.
- da_chicken 2y ago
- madaxe_again 2y agoThey went on strike in 1971 over automation. The outcome was that the ports were forced to accelerate containerisation and automation in order to cover the labour shortage, and many jobs were then lost. Honestly, if they think the outcome will be different this time, I’d love to understand their rationale.
- loudestdog 2y agoUnfortunately there is no time for this theory to be correct. Everyday the Ports are backed up because of strikes, it takes a week afterwards to clear it. So if you can fully automize the ports in 2 weeks your theory might be true. If it takes longer than 2 weeks to fully automize, Your looking at backup of the cargo until next year. I don't know the time it will take to install such automated systems but I assume it will take much longer than 2-3 weeks, probably years.
- triyambakam 2y ago> I’m Danish, and, left leaning. Which means I’m more “eat the rich” than what most of you will encounter. LOL. Yeah right. Come back with your "eat the rich" attitude after actually living in an impoverished country. You'll still want to, but you might actually know how.