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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

#311
post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One aspect of UBI (when/if we can afford to implement it) is that it presents some solution the problem you describe if it's unconditional. If everyone has an set-in-stone income provided by the society because the robots are doing all the low-level jobs and the society doesn't need their labor, then they still have sufficient free time and ability to do something extra to increase their position. There are many usef…

One function of UBI has never been clear to me: if everyone has X, then no one does. Applied to UBI’s case, the baseline of $0 has been “lifted” to say $1500; wouldn’t that just cause the market to increase prices proportionally, until $1500 is effectively the same as $0? Specifically, those baseline goods/services where that $1500 targets? I would imagine luxury goods wouldn’t change much, as those spending in the a…

In a modern first world economy (i.e. the only economy where UBI starts making some sense, and we're probably talking decades in the future so even more automation/productivity than now), the basket of goods that would be considered "basic" constitute something like some inflation caused by extra buying power, but it's not expected to be prohibitive in all the commoditized products such as food; I mean, the amount of consumed food would not change meaningfully as we feed pretty much everybody anyway, the only question is how the compensation is arranged - it doesn't matter that much for the economy if the poor unemployed person gets fed by food stamps, conditional social security, universal basic income, government supplied food packages, charity cash donations or charity soup kitchens.

One aspect that would change is the rental market. We would expect the landlords to try and capture much of that money. However, the big impact of UBI on rent is that it decouples the residental areas from the industrial areas; if you don't need to live where the jobs are and can credibly leave for a place where rents are cheaper, then some people will do so and that puts a limit on the rents.

As you state, small poor communities would feel a significant impact; however, in their case the main effect would be that they would become subsidized by the other parts of the society - much of the UBI they get would be spent on goods coming in from outside; their local market won't impact the price of a bottle of Coca Cola or a bag of potatoes, it's coming "from outside" anyway.

The cost of local services, on the other hand, would become much more spread out - if currently the cost for many services clusters around a single point (often close to minimum wage) because everybody needs a job so they do that service even if they don't want to; and everybody needs to eat, so they have to charge a reasonable amount even if they would be doing it as a hobby; In an UBI world you'd expect the cost of services to spread out widely so that services that are pleasant and interesting (for the provider) are cheaper than now, and services that suck for the workers become more expensive, as the workers now have a choice.

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

#312
post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you break down how you get to "easily" 60%?

If the money is passed back in dividends instead of share buybacks, it's taxed as income. The people who are receiving this income are probably quite wealthy. Let's lowball it and say that they were making $200,000 per year before receiving the dividends. I live in Louisiana, so I'll use a Louisiana income tax calculator [0]. At $200,000 per year, the marginal tax rate is 39.4%. The whole income is not taxed at this…

That's a very close eyeball to 60% actually! I was more surprised that it would be taxed as normal income not at the lower capital gains tax (in your example 15% instead of 39.4%), you seem more knowledgable though.

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

#313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, talking about a fraction of US population, which itself is just a few percent of global population, while billions of lives have been improved is random samples. If you must scope your argument that narrowly, it does not hold. The US also has the greatest opportunity and socioeconomic mobility in the world and this has only improved. Your attempting to piece together a narrative from disparate data while ignorin…

>random samples. “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” >The US also has the greatest opportunity and socioeconomic mobility in the world Hahaha no. We are lagging behind Canada, Australia, Spain, for example, and not by a small margin[1] >we already track measures for what you're talking about Yes! That's my point! >and they all show great improvements. No they do not! They do t…

Fine, I'll concede the point about the USA. But as stated, it's 4% of the global population so discounting the vast majority of the world and how many billions of people live betters means this conversation never started on a decent foundation anyway.

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

#314
post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the money is passed back in dividends instead of share buybacks, it's taxed as income. The people who are receiving this income are probably quite wealthy. Let's lowball it and say that they were making $200,000 per year before receiving the dividends. I live in Louisiana, so I'll use a Louisiana income tax calculator [0]. At $200,000 per year, the marginal tax rate is 39.4%. The whole income is not taxed at this…

That's a very close eyeball to 60% actually! I was more surprised that it would be taxed as normal income not at the lower capital gains tax (in your example 15% instead of 39.4%), you seem more knowledgable though.

It turns out that you are right most of the time on the dividends and as it turns out I was wrong. The distinction seems to be that if you hold the stock for a long time, then dividends count as capital gains. If you hold it for a short time, it's taxed as income [0].

[0]: https://smartasset.com/taxes/dividend-tax-rate

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