New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers • Hacker News Board

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#61

Post by zdkl » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 5:51 PM UTC

snrplfth wrote: post #32

bmcusick wrote: post #2

$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…

You could say that about basically every labour-saving device though. Tractors, earth-moving equipment, container ships, whatever. And even textiles are almost wholly automated now - lots of textiles are grown or spun, woven, dyed and printed almost entirely by automated machines - robots, in effect. Final assembly is in many cases the first time a given piece of textile has been touched by human hands. So why is the…

> So why is the automation of this final step going to be the thing that prevents countries from climbing the "development ladder"?

I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Labour on the other hand is fungible. So with a sweatshop you can go from unskilled workforce to $$$t-shirt$$$ with base supplies and bog standard infrastructure.

Acquiring, operating and conducting maintenance on precision robotics on the other hand...

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#62

Post by snrplfth » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 5:56 PM UTC

Bartweiss wrote: post #54

snrplfth wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that about basically every labour-saving device though. Tractors, earth-moving equipment, container ships, whatever. And even textiles are almost wholly automated now - lots of textiles are grown or spun, woven, dyed and printed almost entirely by automated machines - robots, in effect. Final assembly is in many cases the first time a given piece of textile has been touched by human hands. So why is the…

I'm not convinced this point carries. Sure, "lump of labor" is a fallacy, more productivity is not likely to drive massive unemployment. But that doesn't mean all labor is interchangeably easy in all environments. Competition is still possible. Early tractors didn't do much for underdeveloped nations. Mainframe computers didn't either. The default state of capital-intensive technology is to improve productivity, but…

> Early tractors didn't do much for underdeveloped nations. Mainframe computers didn't either. The default state of capital-intensive technology is to improve productivity, but not to bring capital and work into underdeveloped nations. Whatever benefits accrue there are the diffuse rewards of expanding global production.

When early tractors were being deployed, all regions and countries were quite undeveloped in agricultural mechanization, compared to today. Likewise, when early computers were being created, all countries had primitive infomation technology. The default state of capital intensive technology is to be deployed first where capital is relatively cheap and labour is relatively expensive. The "diffuse rewards" of expanding global production are pretty much the whole point, since the magnitude of those rewards are huge.

The recent economic boom of much of the less-industrialized world was characterized by (compared to the industrialized world) labour-intensive production, true - however, it was much less labor intensive than had been the case before. It was absolutely characterized by people adopting more mechanization, more automation, more technology. So this is why it doesn't make sense to me to think that a high-productivity technology will stall growth. If a t-shirt robot is more expensive than a Bangladeshi textile worker's wage, then we'll see continued high use of human labour in that industry. If the robot becomes cheaper, then the Bangladeshi textile workers will shift to other industries (as they mostly did when they went from being farmers and handcraft workers to being textile workers, over the last few decades.)

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#63

Post by icebraining » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:03 PM UTC

elevensies wrote: post #56

icebraining wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see him doing a taxable transaction on his main holdings How so? Either he passes it on to his heirs or he uses it (selling the stock and realizing gains), both of which are taxable events. Since he has called for an increase on both the capital gains tax and on the estate tax, he'd be affected in any case.

He will contribute the majority of his wealth to charitable foundations. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundat... ). I believe this will allow him to avoid the taxes. I don't have any objection to Bill and Warren choosing strenuously avoid giving their money to the government, and I don't object to what they are doing. What I really object to is Warren advocating for other people's money to p…

Right, but this clever tax loophole called "giving all your money away" is not in any way limited to Buffett, and in fact he's been pushing others to do the same. He's advocating for increasing the tax rate on realized income, including the part that he and his heirs will be realizing.

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#64

Post by snrplfth » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:04 PM UTC

zdkl wrote: post #61

snrplfth wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that about basically every labour-saving device though. Tractors, earth-moving equipment, container ships, whatever. And even textiles are almost wholly automated now - lots of textiles are grown or spun, woven, dyed and printed almost entirely by automated machines - robots, in effect. Final assembly is in many cases the first time a given piece of textile has been touched by human hands. So why is the…

> So why is the automation of this final step going to be the thing that prevents countries from climbing the "development ladder"? I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Labour on the other hand is fungible. So with a sweatshop you can go from unskilled workforce to $$$t-shirt$$$ with base supplies and bog standard infrastructure. Acqui…

> I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't.

Technology is always a matter of degree. Let's say I have a handloom barn making fabric and clothing. Is that already "technology"? If not, then what if I install a diesel generator to power the looms? Then I get some treadle sewing machines to replace hand-stitching? Then I get a laptop to replace hand-accounting? Do I "have technology" yet? As a handloom barn owner, I certainly couldn't have developed or manufactured a diesel generator, a sewing machine, or a laptop, yet I can buy and maintain (or just replace) them quite easily. Doing the same with robots is just a matter of degree and difficulty. Compared with getting humans to do the same work, is it worth it or not?

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#65

Post by mantas » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:14 PM UTC

koops wrote: post #59

mantas wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

.. and no amount of cheap immigrant labour won't stop automation. Which is why the less immigrants, the better. Less people kicked out of jobs == easier to implement UBI or similar system.

Fewer.

Yes, führer

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#66

Post by andrewjl » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:19 PM UTC

HillaryBriss wrote: post #43

joeyo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why will the machines need to be located in Bangladesh? Cheaper repairmen?

i was just thinking like some business owner might: let's try to lower costs in every possible way, including labor.

The owner will be balancing those costs against the cost of shipping and extra logistics overhead for goods destined to North America or Europe.

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#67

Post by pm90 » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:22 PM UTC

Bartweiss wrote: post #58

ams6110 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kenya hasn't developed yet, why do we think it will? Putting it another way, Kenya's development has not been held back by lack of sweatshops but by corrupt government and misguided go-gooderism.

> by lack of sweatshops but by corrupt government I think this is a false contrast. Stable government and reliable infrastructure are the standard requirements for building factories (sweatshop or otherwise) in a country. So a lack of industrialization is frequently a consequence of bad governance. Notably, corruption itself isn't an issue. China, for instance, has plenty of corrupt and autocratic governance. But it…

Excellent point. If you look at China, they took a long time to get to a state where they could start developing reliably. Basically after the fall of the Monarchy, there were revolution after revolution, until the Communist takeover. Even after, it took much later, until the rise of Deng Xiaoping, for development to actually take place. By that time, the State had effectively established itself as the Supreme political power (albeit a non-democratic one) which lead to the stability that allowed massive industrialization to take place rapidly, often with assistance from the State.

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#68

Post by sqeaky » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:35 PM UTC

snrplfth wrote: post #64

zdkl wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So why is the automation of this final step going to be the thing that prevents countries from climbing the "development ladder"? I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Labour on the other hand is fungible. So with a sweatshop you can go from unskilled workforce to $$$t-shirt$$$ with base supplies and bog standard infrastructure. Acqui…

> I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Technology is always a matter of degree. Let's say I have a handloom barn making fabric and clothing. Is that already "technology"? If not, then what if I install a diesel generator to power the looms? Then I get some treadle sewing machines to replace hand-stitching? Then I get a laptop to replac…

I think it is a matter of competition. The unpowered loom does not enable you to compete, but some amount of powering it and accepting a lower wage does allow you to compete with shops that have slightly more tech. Accepting lower wages is how these shops came into existence in the first place.

This is the first production quality version of this robot the next one could be twice as fast. How do you compete with that?

The only way to compete is to build another machine that is cheaper or better. This is not something Bangladesh is able to do.

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#69

Post by zdkl » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:39 PM UTC

snrplfth wrote: post #64

zdkl wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So why is the automation of this final step going to be the thing that prevents countries from climbing the "development ladder"? I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Labour on the other hand is fungible. So with a sweatshop you can go from unskilled workforce to $$$t-shirt$$$ with base supplies and bog standard infrastructure. Acqui…

> I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Technology is always a matter of degree. Let's say I have a handloom barn making fabric and clothing. Is that already "technology"? If not, then what if I install a diesel generator to power the looms? Then I get some treadle sewing machines to replace hand-stitching? Then I get a laptop to replac…

I'm all for rhetorical points, but surely you realise the magnitude of difference in complexity of operation-maintenance between 19th century looms and motors versus non-analog assets.

Not only there's a major difference in degree of difficulty as you note but also the question of support ecosystem.

Re: New t-shirt sewing robot can make as many shirts per hour as 17 factory workers

#70

Post by snrplfth » Wed, Aug 30, 2017, 6:47 PM UTC

sqeaky wrote: post #68

snrplfth wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I believe you're misharacterising the issue. The trouble with technology is that well, you either have it or you don't. Technology is always a matter of degree. Let's say I have a handloom barn making fabric and clothing. Is that already "technology"? If not, then what if I install a diesel generator to power the looms? Then I get some treadle sewing machines to replace hand-stitching? Then I get a laptop to replac…

I think it is a matter of competition. The unpowered loom does not enable you to compete, but some amount of powering it and accepting a lower wage does allow you to compete with shops that have slightly more tech. Accepting lower wages is how these shops came into existence in the first place. This is the first production quality version of this robot the next one could be twice as fast. How do you compete with that…

The point is that if the robot really is that fast, and that cheap, then you don't compete - you start doing something else where the robot cannot compete at that price. Textile workers aren't robots - they have the capacity to shift to other work, and there's an enormous amount of work to be done.

This objection to automation has been brought up every time anything's been invented, for hundreds of years - if we do something with less human labour, then humans won't have work or incomes. But actually, they just end up finding other useful things to do that weren't getting done before.