No Recent Automation Revolution • Hacker News Board

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#71

Post by taneq » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:45 AM UTC

raducu wrote: post #27

Swizec wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The revolution won't be the automation. It'll be in us accepting that the job wasn't who we were/are and it's okay to let it go This is perhaps the only thing socialism got right. At least the flavor we had in Yugoslavia and the remnants it left on the psyche of my parent's generation. You do your job, then you go home and live your actual life. The job exists as a way to "pay your dues" in society, but it isn't yo…

"Money doesn't buy happiness" is just something we tell the poor so they don't revolt -- this also applied to communism -- the communist elites lived a much better life materially and socially. Sure, average Ivan was "happy" because his neighbors had just as crappy flat, just as crappy car, just as crappy job, just as crappy food and so on and there was no way for him to "better" his life because money was meaningles…

Money may not buy happiness but poverty sure can remove it.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#72

Post by yurishimo » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:45 AM UTC

tschwimmer wrote: post #40

lettergram wrote: post #25

We are only a couple years away from automating most customer servicing. You’ll still need a few, but if we collect data on the few it’s possible to scale those answers to millions. That’ll put millions out of work and is basically text generation... easy to deploy, easy to maintain, and we probably already have the technology just not productionized. Now, those people will be retrained to do something. Maybe even ju…

I agree with you, but probably not for the same reason. I think Millennials are less comfortable talking with people and are willing to put up with less flexible and less powerful automated solutions where their parents would not. Expect customer service to get even worse with automation, not better.

I disagree with this being a millennial problem, but it's rather a Gen Z issue.

I'm approaching 26 and still vastly prefer talking to people to solve my issues. Perhaps this is because I work in software and am aware of the massive pile of crap most phone trees are so there is some bias here.

My go to solution to get a person on the phone is whenever a machine asks me "What can I help you with?", I purposefully mumble and make weird noises that it cannot understand. 2-3 repeats and it gives up and automatically passes me to an operator or CSR. I assume this is to better help the elderly or disabled but it sure is useful if you know it exists.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#73

Post by gigel82 » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:50 AM UTC

I don't know enough about industrial automation to form an opinion, but RPA is definitely coming for the rank-and-file office drones.

You'd be surprised how many "paper pushers" still fill the cubicles of this world (their job literally to copy stuff from this ERP to this CRM or to this legacy Access / Excel / BI system). This is the low hanging fruit of job automation and enterprises are quickly figuring out what kind of cost savings RPA can offer them.

I have a feeling RPA will have a much higher adoption rate than the "digital transformation" trickle.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#74

Post by yk » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:50 AM UTC

> Last December, Keller Scholl and I posted a working paper suggesting that this whole narrative is bullshit, at least so far.

Thing is, when you are calculating the color of the sky, then it is either a bluish looking spectra, or you are in trouble. And consequently physicists will look outside immediately after that calculation.

The entire post needs an explanation of why they don't find any automation in that timeframe? I mean, just from administration we have things like package managers, containers, several cloud stuff, and so on. If they don't see that in their data, then my immediate assumption is, that they need a more reasonable approach.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#75

Post by yurishimo » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:53 AM UTC

gremlinsinc wrote: post #55

pragmatic wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sceptic in me wonders how much capital the fast food industry is willing to invest to replace cheap labor. I'm not really arguing with you just reflecting on my own experiences with current start of the art tech. "Did you say at fries to that?" No "Added 27 orders of fries, anything else" Arghhhh!

w/ touch screen you don't need to 'speak' unless maybe blind or something... So, you could be more accurate.. I mean I ALWAYS use mobile ordering now when going through drive through. I'll pull over, sit for a moment, place my order, then get in line.

Since COVID started I've been using some mobile ordering apps more and more. One of my new favorites is Whataburger here in Texas.

Texans know that Whataburger is infamous for being slow since everything is made to order. In-n-Out has figured it out but Whataburger is still so slow for some reason. With the app, I can place an order in my driveway, then arrive at the drive thru about the time its ready. If I'm lucky, I can skip the line and pull up and have it brought out in a few minutes. What used to be a 20 minute parking lot wait crawling through the line is now 5~ minutes.

Sometimes if it's busy or late at night and they don't have as many staff, I have to wait my turn in line, but I'm usually not sitting for 5 minutest at the window after paying waiting for the grill. Oh and that's another benefit. Apple Pay makes it seamless to place an order and not deal with CCs that are wearing out being declined.

My biggest complaint is still being required to download a separate app for each restaurant, but for now I can tuck them all away into a folder and forget they exist. If an app isn't in my home screen, I'm going to open it from a spotlight search.

For restaurants I don't visit as frequently, I'll call them and place an order for pickup. This also has the benefit of not incurring many of the BS fees that specialty online ordering platforms charge. It's going to take me a few minutes to order anyway, app or call, so I might as well save 10% by calling.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#76

Post by foogazi » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:57 AM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #26

jsmith12673 wrote: post #19

Economics noob here: the paper concludes that past automation is predicted by 2 key factors: pay and employment. What does that mean exactly? Are they saying that higher a job pays, the more likely it is to get automated? Or the other way around? Also what does 'employment' refer to exactly? Is measuring how well the demand for labour is being met in a certain job?

> Are they saying that higher a job pays, the more likely it is to get automated? Yes. "Simple economic theory predicts that, all else equal, employers are more eager to automate jobs with higher pay and more workers. So these two factors should predict job automation. And we do in fact see such effects in Table 3, though more consistently for pay than employment." > what does 'employment' refer to exactly? Number of…

No one will automate for automations sake - businesses choose how to deploy capital to improve efficiency, which can be achieved through scale or going after the largest cost

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#77

Post by stewbrew » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 4:57 AM UTC

So, an Amazon warehouse works like a grocery store from back then? What is the ratio #sold goods / #human worker for Amazon and for an old fashioned grocery store?

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#78

Post by virgilp » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 5:03 AM UTC

tuatoru wrote: post #69

An independent line of evidence looks at the formation of new occupations over time. If automation were taking over jobs, or jobs were being refactored because some tasks are automated, then we'd expect to see new job titles appearing in employment advertising and classifications such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics's. This does happen, as it has happened since the start of the Industrial Revolution. "Social Media…

> That is also incompatible with the claim that an automation revolution is under way.

    “How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

    “Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#79

Post by missedthecue » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 5:04 AM UTC

raducu wrote: post #27

Swizec wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The revolution won't be the automation. It'll be in us accepting that the job wasn't who we were/are and it's okay to let it go This is perhaps the only thing socialism got right. At least the flavor we had in Yugoslavia and the remnants it left on the psyche of my parent's generation. You do your job, then you go home and live your actual life. The job exists as a way to "pay your dues" in society, but it isn't yo…

"Money doesn't buy happiness" is just something we tell the poor so they don't revolt -- this also applied to communism -- the communist elites lived a much better life materially and socially. Sure, average Ivan was "happy" because his neighbors had just as crappy flat, just as crappy car, just as crappy job, just as crappy food and so on and there was no way for him to "better" his life because money was meaningles…

Money doesn't buy happiness. All it can do is buy distraction and remove physical discomfort like starving or sleeping in the rain or riding a bike instead of a car

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#80

Post by 082349872349872 » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 5:06 AM UTC

Living in a country where people are expensive and machines are cheap, I can attest the automation level is higher here. For instance, I often see cows at farms here enjoying automated brushing systems. There are youtube videos in english, but I don't recall ever having seen something like that in the US, even at Harris Ranch.

(I have yet to witness a farmer using fully-autonomous hay feeding robots, but the ag magazines have been running articles on them)