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

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

#221

Post by stale2002 »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #195
stale2002 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have predicted that it would be a problem every year for the last hundred years. And those people were all proven false. How many times do the same predictions have to be proven false before we don't take them seriously anymore? People won't do that though. We will continue to hear the same predictions for another hundred years, and every time the people making will say "but this time it's different!"

You're right, energy resources are limitless so there's no possibility a system based on ever growing consumption could possibly fail. /s

The laws of physics are of course true. But we will run into "infinite growth" issues in a couple thousand years. Not in a couple decades.

The burden of proof is on you, if you want to argue that the limits of growth are right around the corner.

I have been hearing people yell the the same arguement that you are making about infinite growth for years. And yet every year they get proven wrong. So talk to me in a thousand years, when we actually start to hit those limits.

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

#222

Post by EpicEng »

joejerryronnie wrote: post #213
EpicEng wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps you should go ask a blacksmith. btw, unemployment is extremely low currently.

Just wait a couple hundred years and your skills will be back in demand. Artisanal blacksmiths make a killing today.

Sure, all twelve of them. It's a cottage industry, but I think you understood the point I was making.

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

#223

Post by __s »

liquidise wrote: post #3

Modern societies are going to have a very real problem to grapple with as this replacement goes from newsworthy to the norm. This could result in significant worker displacement with massive bottom-line ROI for companies in the next decade or two, particularly as minimum wages rise. I'm not of the opinion that this automation will create an equal number of jobs for the ones they replace. Even if they do, it is unlike…

I'd suggest reading The Driver, by Garet Garrett

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

#224

Post by eddieroger »

kopo wrote: post #28
excalibur wrote: post #5

How about instead of selling robots to companies to replace their laborers, we sell robots to the workers to do their jobs. You keep getting paid as long as you keep your robot running.

On Star Trek doesn't everyone have their own Replicator than can churn out anything? Why does someone even need to get paid? Just make one from your replicator and ship it to a friend in need.

I'm not sure if this is serious, but I'll risk the miss and say that they addressed this in TNG, saying that humanity evolved past the economies of earlier times.

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

#225

Post by merpnderp »

ardy42 wrote: post #214
dymk wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

> 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? I don't think "most voters" who don't see themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires would shed a tear if CEOs, business owners, members of the management and ownership class, etc. had their ability to own robots limited. At least after so…

Telling a person they can't own something because they might create too much value, sure seems antithetical to western values of personal freedom.

And why not take your idea further. Only one person per truck? Per acre of farmland? Per airplane? Per computer? Per pencil? Per lathe?

Why shed a tear over lost crappy factory jobs when those people might be better employed fixing the robots, at a higher wage and skill set?

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

#226

Post by Schwolop »

nerdponx wrote: post #189
brycehamrick wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "job" as a foundation of modern life is the result of the industrialized revolution and, while it served its purposed, is something we need to abandon as quickly as possible. Corporations don't have a monopoly on economic value creation. We should be, as a government and society, encouraging independent tradesmen/women, entrepreneurship, and artisanry. If we can manage that, job loss due to automation is no longe…

We can't manage it until we remove employment as the sole condition for access to basic services like healthcare. We also need to ensure that people are able to retrain themselves if/when their job becomes obsolete.

The rest of the world _has_ worked this first point out. The US is close enough to the only developed country that ties healthcare to employment.

The second point is a given in the more socialised parts of Europe, and is a core tenet of most support programs for the involuntarily unemployed elsewhere.

Which is to say; I don't get your point. Sounds like everywhere but the US could do this right now.

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

#227

Post by grecy »

nerdponx wrote: post #189
brycehamrick wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "job" as a foundation of modern life is the result of the industrialized revolution and, while it served its purposed, is something we need to abandon as quickly as possible. Corporations don't have a monopoly on economic value creation. We should be, as a government and society, encouraging independent tradesmen/women, entrepreneurship, and artisanry. If we can manage that, job loss due to automation is no longe…

We can't manage it until we remove employment as the sole condition for access to basic services like healthcare. We also need to ensure that people are able to retrain themselves if/when their job becomes obsolete.

> We can't manage it until we remove employment as the sole condition for access to basic services like healthcare

Many countries don't have that limitation.

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

#228

Post by sanxiyn »

nerdponx wrote: post #182
stickfigure wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

your typical consumer will receive very little or no direct benefit from this change Eh? I've shopped at Uniqlo in SF. Compared to buying clothes at hipster boutiques, it was shockingly affordable. I'd say whatever they are doing is unquestionably offering a direct benefit to the consumer.

You already receive that benefit. Will prices go down as a result of this automation? Will the freed resources be cleanly rerouted to other activities? Hell no, if there wasn't an article you'd never have noticed.

> Will prices go down ... you'd never have noticed.

Note that these two are entirely compatible. Prices routinely go down and customers receive benefit but they do not notice.

For example, I wrote about research on effect of barcode scanner here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11414435

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

#229

Post by lovich »

EpicEng wrote: post #202
nerdponx wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You already receive that benefit. Will prices go down as a result of this automation? Will the freed resources be cleanly rerouted to other activities? Hell no, if there wasn't an article you'd never have noticed.

>Will prices go down as a result of this automation? Can you name a single instance where prices did _not_ go down due to automation? You're saying process won't go down tomorrow, but of course that's not how any of this works.

Prices don't go down unless there is competition. If a company figures our a way to make massive cost savings while their competition does not, they pocket that margin and use it to either invest in more productive capacity or give back to shareholders. They don't feel some ethical need to lower prices just because they can

Automation is correlated with cost savings for consumers because usually the competition can figure out the same thing after seeing another player do it. It's a mistake to think they are causally related

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

#230

Post by cpsempek »

nerdponx wrote: post #182
stickfigure wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

your typical consumer will receive very little or no direct benefit from this change Eh? I've shopped at Uniqlo in SF. Compared to buying clothes at hipster boutiques, it was shockingly affordable. I'd say whatever they are doing is unquestionably offering a direct benefit to the consumer.

You already receive that benefit. Will prices go down as a result of this automation? Will the freed resources be cleanly rerouted to other activities? Hell no, if there wasn't an article you'd never have noticed.

Pocketing extra margin dollars is not necessarily profit maximizing. As other have pointed out, depending on where their customers (and currently priced out customers) are on the demand curve, reducing prices could increase profits. I expect Uniqlo to seek to maximize profits.
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