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

America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 753 posts

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#121

Post by dfedbeef »

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #60
thaack wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no involvement with the plant directly. My understanding is the best luck they had was getting in good graces with local probation officers & craigslist classifieds. Job portals were pretty useless from my understanding.

> the best luck they had was getting in good graces with local probation officers & craigslist classifieds. I appreciate the answer. And I understand that you may not have more-granular info than this. But I am wondering what how jobs were advertised prior to utilizing ProbOff/CL. Maybe the answer is this. There was no avenue to get job listings in front of the most likely eyeballs.

Uh... The newspaper.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#122

Post by Spooky23 »

pseudocomposer wrote: post #63
thaack wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most people in Western world also cannot imagine staying at conveyor belt or table doing the same assembly task whole week. I work in a factory and see this daily. My family owns a small plastic manufacturing plant in the US. This is the biggest problem they face. The western worker's appetite for a low skill monotonous manufacturing job is very small. The business loses employees to Walmart etc. despite the factor…

Obviously, the “higher pay and significantly better benefits” are not actually significantly better. I’d rather we address that than just exploit some other workers overseas where they’re out of sight, out of mind. Honestly, it seems like tariffs on imported goods would be the way around this, but also, we need to be sure that money is going to the people doing the work, not just the owners. Speaking of which, I don’…

I’m not the OP. Heavy labor is… a lot of work. It’s rough in the body and some people aren’t cut for it.

In the 90s as a high school kid, I made $14/hr as a farmhand when the minimum wage was $4.75. They’d hire 4 crews of 4 guys each and we’d lose about half through the summer. They were great family to work for, but the work was hella hard. You could go retrieve shopping carts for $4.75 an hour and smoke weed all day, and many of my former coworkers did.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#123

Post by Stephen_0xFF »

ryandrake wrote: post #108
mullingitover wrote: post #44

The US spent decades transitioning from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, deliberately. Now there's a populist making political hay, throwing out numbers about trade deficits, which ignores revenue from services . Yes, there is have a trade deficit on goods, that was a long-term strategy because services were a superior investment. Manufacturing is an inferior way to make money unless you're planning to g…

I don't know why people romanticize 1950-style manufacturing jobs so much, like they are some kind of objectively ideal job. These jobs really weren't great. Bunch of dudes standing at an assembly line all day physically busting their asses and sweating it out. Sometimes in a physically hazardous environment. Sometimes breathing stinky and/or harmful chemicals. Sometimes surrounded by ear-damaging loud noises. Someti…

Nostalgia more than anything. At the time a factory job could buy you a home out of high school, have a wife that stays home and takes care of the children. The factory job itself is a red herring. What people actually want is a post WW2 baby booming economy.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#124

Post by selimthegrim »

kelipso wrote: post #37
thaack wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most people in Western world also cannot imagine staying at conveyor belt or table doing the same assembly task whole week. I work in a factory and see this daily. My family owns a small plastic manufacturing plant in the US. This is the biggest problem they face. The western worker's appetite for a low skill monotonous manufacturing job is very small. The business loses employees to Walmart etc. despite the factor…

Feels like there are a bunch of factories like that in the Midwest even now. There's a Honda factory near the Columbus, OH area where you have a bunch of employees doing absolute monotonous work all day like checking if a screw is the right shape or something. These jobs are slowly getting automated but it's not like no one would do them if they are available.

Marysville

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#125

Post by shermantanktop »

Tadpole9181 wrote: post #115
thaack wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most people in Western world also cannot imagine staying at conveyor belt or table doing the same assembly task whole week. I work in a factory and see this daily. My family owns a small plastic manufacturing plant in the US. This is the biggest problem they face. The western worker's appetite for a low skill monotonous manufacturing job is very small. The business loses employees to Walmart etc. despite the factor…

I don't mean for this to be as pointed as it probably will come off - but do you allow these workers to listen to music, take regular (not smoke) breaks, and do their job from a chair? The few factory jobs I've seen were not only monotonous, they were needlessly soul crushing . For no reason at all, you had to stand for hours on end. Your only breaks were lunch and smokes. Bathroom breaks were monitored like a crime.…

“MBA shrinkflated garbage”

I’m definitely going to find a way to slip this into a conversation.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#126

Post by Bratmon »

ryandrake wrote: post #108
mullingitover wrote: post #44

The US spent decades transitioning from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, deliberately. Now there's a populist making political hay, throwing out numbers about trade deficits, which ignores revenue from services . Yes, there is have a trade deficit on goods, that was a long-term strategy because services were a superior investment. Manufacturing is an inferior way to make money unless you're planning to g…

I don't know why people romanticize 1950-style manufacturing jobs so much, like they are some kind of objectively ideal job. These jobs really weren't great. Bunch of dudes standing at an assembly line all day physically busting their asses and sweating it out. Sometimes in a physically hazardous environment. Sometimes breathing stinky and/or harmful chemicals. Sometimes surrounded by ear-damaging loud noises. Someti…

Manufacturing jobs are mostly unionized and service jobs aren't.

Americans actually want unions back, but because anti-union propaganda is so prevalent, they confused themselves into thinking they want manufacturing jobs back

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#127

Post by Spooky23 »

stouset wrote: post #102
Pulcinella wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need actual data to decide how significant is "significant." Otherwise you will just have businesses complaining no one wants to work for "significantly" higher pay (a whole $0.05/hour more).

I’m sorry but this is a ridiculous take. $0.05/hr is $104 a year for a full-time job. Zero people are going to have that be the tipping point for them to take on a monotonous, often physically draining job that they’d otherwise turn down.

You underestimate the low end of the labor market. People may not jump for a nickel, but they absolutely will for $0.25-0.30.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#128

Post by a_bonobo »

lnsru wrote: post #21

Just my 5 cents. Running factory is damn hard job. 10 products built from 50 different parts having 70 different vendors is a small nightmare. So me people can manage that, but the most can’t. Most people in Western world also cannot imagine staying at conveyor belt or table doing the same assembly task whole week. I work in a factory and see this daily.

I used to work in such a factory in Germany and turn-over was high :) A large pool of uni students doing their summer breaks propped up the place. They could afford to work there for 1-2 months mentally because they knew they'd go back to university (me, too). The few long-timers on the factory floor were mostly functioning alcoholics.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#129

Post by kube-system »

lesuorac wrote: post #101
rgblambda wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my limited experience working in a factory environment, listening to music can be a real workplace safety issue if it reduces your ability to hear forklifts or coworkers shouting warnings.

Do you hire deaf people? I always found the laws prohibiting drivers from wearing earplugs (some exemptions for motorcycles) and the like pretty funny.

US employers cannot discriminate against a deaf person and must make reasonable accommodations to make it safe for them to do their job.

US employers are not legally required to make accommodations for people who simply want to listen to music at work.

Today's vehicles already have a lot of sound deadening (and good stereos) and it is becoming a problem for emergency vehicles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lvTBmBDPno

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#130

Post by motorest »

lesuorac wrote: post #101
rgblambda wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my limited experience working in a factory environment, listening to music can be a real workplace safety issue if it reduces your ability to hear forklifts or coworkers shouting warnings.

Do you hire deaf people? I always found the laws prohibiting drivers from wearing earplugs (some exemptions for motorcycles) and the like pretty funny.

> Do you hire deaf people?

I think you may start to understand the requirement once you realize the issue is where attention is and is not placed, instead of what sense is being exercised.

I mean, think about it. The recommendation was to consume forms of entertainment. In the factory I worked, there was a mandatory safety rule where you were required to establish eye contact with forklift drivers. Why is that a requirement?

Post reply on HN