Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

qz.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 314 posts

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#141

Post by fucking_tragedy »

refurb wrote: post #136
mschuster91 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a socialist and yet I believe that neither Stalin's Gulags nor Mao's mass hunger deaths are something that should be repeated. Authoritarian socialism has been proven to not work, what the world desperately needs is liberal/libertarian socialism. We can learn from history - ok, those who openly fly the Nazi flag not, but majority of society can see the problems like homelessness, drug epidemics and exploding rent…

Libertarian socialism? So a minimal govt that owns all the means of production? My head just exploded.

The word libertarianism originally referred to a socialist school of thought[0].

> Traditionally, libertarianism was a term for a form of left-wing politics; such left-libertarian ideologies seek to abolish capitalism and private ownership of the means of production, or else to restrict their purview or effects, in favor of common or cooperative ownership and management, viewing private property as a barrier to freedom and liberty. In the United States, modern right-libertarian ideologies, such as minarchism and anarcho-capitalism, co-opted the term in the mid-20th century to instead advocate laissez-faire capitalism and strong private property rights, such as in land, infrastructure, and natural resources.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#142

Post by natchiketa »

ry_ry wrote: post #89
taneq wrote: post #4

It's OK, the staff will just find new jobs as electronics engineers and machine learning researchers. /s

Strictly playing devil's advocate, but is the lifelong employment of their staff uniqlo's problem? If you found a cheaper supplier of milk, would you feel obligated to reimburse your milk man? (may be a misplaced cultural reference, but in the UK 20+ years ago a chap delivering you milk to your door every morning on a rolling contract basis was the norm - generally they do other stuff now)

When I read a story like this, I'm not faulting a Uniqlo for choosing progress. It's logical and extremely profitable. I think the alarm is precisely because of how much sense it makes.

Enough incremental progress has been made for us to arrive at this threshold, after which a company like Uniqlo can lay off 90% of their workforce by investing an amount which is, if I'm not mistaken[0], considerably less than what they profit in one year.

That's not incremental. It's unprecedented.

[0] https://www.fastretailing.com/eng/ir/financial/summary.html

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#143

Post by whycombinater »

ardy42 wrote: post #30
sharkweek wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lower class gets bigger and bigger, and is either kept just happy enough to not revolt or... At some point this boils over and the ultra wealthy are forced to redistribute wealth either through new political policy or by violent force.

> At some point this boils over and the ultra wealthy are forced to redistribute wealth either through new political policy or by violent force. There's also the dystopian possibility that automated forms of social control are developed neuter the ability of any kind of popular political movement from challenging the elites. That automation could be anything from systems of censorship, surveillance, and propaganda to…

"And just before the nuke hit, he reflected on what a great life he had. Under his watch, Skynet raised the percentage of female programmers to an even 50%."

Of course, some would see that that's actually a DYStopia, I mean, where are the trans?!

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#144

Post by dymk »

ardy42 wrote: post #121
merpnderp wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, you'd have to curtail the freedom of some people to own robots and drastically limit how others could use them. This is a non-starter for most voters.

> This is a non-starter for most voters. Only to the degree that they've been trained to see themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires, and identify more with the interests of the owners than their own personal interests.

How do you think a law would work, which would only allow floor workers to own/operate robots, but not the workers (the CEO/warehouse foreman) that oversee other workers?

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#145

Post by [deleted] »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18
sharkweek wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lower class gets bigger and bigger, and is either kept just happy enough to not revolt or... At some point this boils over and the ultra wealthy are forced to redistribute wealth either through new political policy or by violent force.

> At some point this boils over and the ultra wealthy are forced to redistribute wealth either through new political policy or by violent force Not necessarily. The same robotic technology that decouples low-skill labour inputs and outputs is decoupling populations from force projection capabilities. Less cynically, there are organic ways for the situation to positively evolve ( e.g. higher across-board labour produc…

[deleted]

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#146

Post by throw2016 »

Technology is not stoppable and if jobs are going to be lost they will be. Ultimately all tech has been absorbed into society.

But many also cynically use 'threats' of technology to scaremonger and try to keep wages low. This is incredibly exploitative. For instance this story itself is thin on details and talks up 90% without mentioning the actual numbers or details of the automation. Amazon bought Kiva and while the robots are used they continue to hire aggressively.

If McDonalds or anyone else can use robots efficiently today they will. No company is employing workers out of goodwill but because they need them. If one must worry current trends show the environment may create far more disruption than automation.

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#147

Post by lamarpye »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #108
stale2002 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you have noticed, but unemployment is at a multi decade low. We are not seeing pervasive unemployment, we are seeing the opposite. A situation where there are too many jobs, and not enough workers to fill them So econ 201 would say that there isn't any societial problem right now.

Then why are wages so stagnant?

The increasing size of the unskilled labor pool? Could that be it?

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#148

Post by tathougies »

fucking_tragedy wrote: post #100
tathougies wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One concrete step can be getting rid of the capital requirements (by regulation) to invest. The idea of 'qualified investors' is literally a way to keep poor people poor, and rich people rich, by cutting off poor or middle class people from the major vehicles of wealth creation. It is ridiculous that I cannot invest in the IPO of a company in my local neighborhood because, while I have enough money to satisfy the bus…

That could create a moral hazard, where businesses court mom & pop investors, who don't have the means to pursue legal action against the company should they do something less than scrupulous with their investments, instead of investors with the means to hold them accountable.

I certainly don't disagree, but the idea that someone like me, who has no debt, and who is in no danger of losing my lifestyle should not be allowed to invest because I don't have 'enough' is absurd. I would be in support of requirements where you have to show to the government that investing will not cause you to lose your livelihood, but most people do not need $1million in the bank in order to achieve that goal.

For example, I have several hundred thousand saved, and wanted to invest 20k of that in a business in my neighborhood that was doing a public offering. Because I 'only' make in the 100k-200k range, and I 'only' have 300k in the bank, versus the 1 million required by the government, I was deprived of this otherwise perfectly fine opportunity.

It is clear to me that the regulatory environment we have now is not at all fair. I am certain that my system would cost the government more. However, the government should be happy to take on extra expense when it means the creation of richer taxpayers, and the democratization of capital, IMO.

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#149

Post by tathougies »

mschuster91 wrote: post #99
tathougies wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One concrete step can be getting rid of the capital requirements (by regulation) to invest. The idea of 'qualified investors' is literally a way to keep poor people poor, and rich people rich, by cutting off poor or middle class people from the major vehicles of wealth creation. It is ridiculous that I cannot invest in the IPO of a company in my local neighborhood because, while I have enough money to satisfy the bus…

These capital requirements are regulations that have been introduced as a response to companies fleecing the poor-ish, the uneducated and those who had a bit of cash, but decided to put it into one (fraudulent) investment. Drop them and you'll see what already is happening in the cryptocoin scene: people getting exploited left and right. Point is, no sofa investor will be a shark and get rich, contrary to the ICO pro…

Notice I said 'neighborhood business'. I feel comparing ICOs -- which usually consist of a team you've never met asking you for money for a product you've never seen -- to an established neighborhood business interested in raising capital for expansion of a proven business model is comparing apples to oranges.

Re: Uniqlo cut 90% of staff at one warehouse by replacing them with robots

#150

Post by tathougies »

darpa_escapee wrote: post #84
tathougies wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be interested in the numbers, but based on my experience of homelessness in California, most homelessness is due to severe mental health issues, not poverty. I'm unsure of any data suggesting these kinds of mental health issues are increasing, but I'd be interested in the data. Also, having seen the situation in third world countries, I have a real issue calling American homelessness destitution, but I unders…

Homelessness is overwhelmingly caused by economic issues[1][2], even in the Bay area[3], which are certainly exacerbated by mental health issues. [1] https://www.nlchp.org/documents/Homeless_Stats_Fact_Sheet [2] http://homelessresourcenetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/0... [3] https://www.spur.org/publications/urbanist-article/2017-10-2...

I have no doubt homelessness in San Francisco is caused by poverty. However, San Francisco is not california. Do your data apply to California as a whole, or just the bay? San Francisco is a very bad choice in city to extrapolate from.
Post reply on HN