21–30 of 95 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The article says the cost in Bangladesh is 22 cents. That is surely close enough, after taking into account transport and lead time, that factories in Bangladesh should be worried.
how much will the human labor cost per shirt be once these automatic t-shirt machines are moved to Bangladesh?
Should we need a basic standard of what can be called Robots? We're in an age of journalism where almost anything that can do what humans do (Guess, had calculator been invented in this age,'This automated Robot can do as many calculation as 3 Accountants' would have been a viral article) is called a Robot. But what we forget is that it's always been the case all this while, Consider a Toll collection booth with huma…
$0.33 per shirt, anywhere in the world, is nearly as cheap as the cheapest sweatshop markets. I expect most commentary will look at this using a US vs China thing, but I'm more worried about SE Asia and Africa. They need to climb up the development ladder that China's already 1/2-way up. Say what you will about clothing and sneaker sweatshops, but they were a tried and tested method for building up the basics of an i…
This reminds me about when Bill Gates make that comment saying that raising the minimal wage could make the cost trade-off of investing in automation worthwhile [1]. On one hand, people need living wages. But on the other hand, I think we're witnessing what Bill Gates is talking about here. What's the solution? Gates has floated the idea of taxing robots. [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-bots-are-taking…
But what's a robot? Is a 3D printer a robot? (it has moving parts and builds things) is the Google Adwords code a robot? (it sure makes a lot of money) a quant hedge fund? Do you tax all computers by cost or value produced? Seems simpler to tax companies for making money. EDIT: We won't need middle-manager bots that show each other powerpoints all day. What "robot" would get taxed for the disappearance of that functi…
$0.33 per shirt, anywhere in the world, is nearly as cheap as the cheapest sweatshop markets. I expect most commentary will look at this using a US vs China thing, but I'm more worried about SE Asia and Africa. They need to climb up the development ladder that China's already 1/2-way up. Say what you will about clothing and sneaker sweatshops, but they were a tried and tested method for building up the basics of an i…
I don't see this as bad. Being able to manufacture simple things just increases how complex things can be for a certain cost. CNC and automated process control isn't killing Asian metalworking.
This reminds me about when Bill Gates make that comment saying that raising the minimal wage could make the cost trade-off of investing in automation worthwhile [1]. On one hand, people need living wages. But on the other hand, I think we're witnessing what Bill Gates is talking about here. What's the solution? Gates has floated the idea of taxing robots. [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-bots-are-taking…
But what's a robot? Is a 3D printer a robot? (it has moving parts and builds things) is the Google Adwords code a robot? (it sure makes a lot of money) a quant hedge fund? Do you tax all computers by cost or value produced? Seems simpler to tax companies for making money. EDIT: We won't need middle-manager bots that show each other powerpoints all day. What "robot" would get taxed for the disappearance of that functi…
Only if that money makes its way back to the people who would otherwise have been employed because of the robot tax.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The article says the cost in Bangladesh is 22 cents. That is surely close enough, after taking into account transport and lead time, that factories in Bangladesh should be worried.
how much will the human labor cost per shirt be once these automatic t-shirt machines are moved to Bangladesh?
But, if your target market is US (or Europe) you've got shipping costs to get your finished shirts to the US (or European) market. If the machine is in the US (or Europe) those shipping costs are substantially lower (and with much less latency).
The lower latency (meaning you can sell shirts in a more "on-demand" manner) and much lower shipping costs might well outweigh the labor savings of the Bangladesh worker overseeing the machine.
Why should I be surprised. That's been happening since 1700´s [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution ] Perhaps that will be the way the most developed Countries will return some of the production lines to them.
"Perhaps that will be the way the most developed Countries will return some of the production lines to them" Why do you care about that? ecology? It's not like if it's going to translate in jobs.
Why should I be surprised. That's been happening since 1700´s [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution ] Perhaps that will be the way the most developed Countries will return some of the production lines to them.
The Worshipful Company of Framework Knitters was incorporated in 1657 London.
Some framework knitters were among the Luddites, who resisted the transition to factories.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_knitting#Industrial...
I can't quite decide which will be the tipping point for robots replacing humans: Agriculture, food service, or garments. The first seems ripe (no pun intended) for disruption but apparently often requires human skill to identify products. The second seems more likely, as fast food is mostly automated with some human intervention; coupled with self-checkout technology in any language, and it might work. Garments, how…
I recently came across this video of a color sensing tomato sorting machine. https://youtu.be/j4RWJTs0QCk Really shifted my mental ranking of where agricultural processing was at.
I'm more impressed by the various types of field harvesters