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Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

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Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#11

Post by adventureful »

baby wrote: post #5

> Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete That could make a huge numbers of job in the US obsolete as well.

The biggest threat to simple repetitive manual labor based manufacturing is robotics. The US has seen that type of domestic manufacturing decline to almost nothing over the last 30 years. China by far and away dominates that.

High level manufacturing could certainly be threatened by robotics, but labor in the US is a much smaller portion of costs when you're talking about jet engines or medical devices than sewing a shirt (eg if you're paying $80k per year for labor, you're not going to be making $7 toasters in the US at that rate, you're going to be making million dollar jet engines; and you can't get labor costs below around $22,500 total in a manufacturing environment in the US).

The US lost the garment industry because its labor couldn't compete on wages. The average garment worker in China isn't making anywhere near $7.25 per hour, which is the US Federal minimum wage. Legally the US literally can't compete on wages.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#12

Post by adventureful »

warmwaffles wrote: post #10
adventureful wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing, but they have everything to lose from them and the US (and other nations) has everything to gain, because the US has already completely lost the garment industry. China already has a massive supply of human labor, which is primarily why their labor costs are so low. If you were to automate their labor, it would cause substantial unemployment and or reductions in pay. I'd argue their society couldn't withstan…

> There's no winning scenario for China from robotic manufacturing. This is a good point. Although I would argue that yes America would reacquire the garment industry some what, however the parts that make the machine up will still be manufactured by overseas competitors. I think they are on the right track but the problem still lies in manufacturing chips and metal pieces cost substantially less overseas.

I agree. It's not a scenario in which the US is magically going to re-dominate 55% of global manufacturing like it's 1964 all over again. But it is plausible the US can retake a portion of manufacturing.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#14

Post by tonyedgecombe »

drsim wrote: post #13

In some time this may be the case. But I'm sceptical that the capital cost will be less than the labour cost in these countries. And is China the last post for cheap labour.

I guess it depends on the cost of shipping in terms of money and time and any other costs associated with buying from another continent.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#15

Post by adventureful »

drsim wrote: post #13

In some time this may be the case. But I'm sceptical that the capital cost will be less than the labour cost in these countries. And is China the last post for cheap labour.

Global labor costs are rising, rather than decreasing. China has seen substantial increases in their labor costs over the last decade. That works against them and in favor of robotics (which will perpetually fall in cost).

Generally speaking, people always want to be paid more, but people have a very finite output capacity when it comes to base manual labor.

Robotic productivity has a radically higher output capability over time.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#17

Post by seivan »

adventureful wrote: post #6
stargazer-3 wrote: post #2

And what stops Chinese from making those machines?

Nothing, but they have everything to lose from them and the US (and other nations) has everything to gain, because the US has already completely lost the garment industry. China already has a massive supply of human labor, which is primarily why their labor costs are so low. If you were to automate their labor, it would cause substantial unemployment and or reductions in pay. I'd argue their society couldn't withstan…

Which is a good thing. The more money stays in the US or EU instead of going to Asia, the better.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#18

Post by mrgrieves »

> ...robots could return manufacturing of smartphones, computers and TVs to U.S. shores

China will rule electronics for the foreseeable future. Even if its advantage in labor costs were eliminated, China's parts ecosystem, lax recycling regulations, and (increasingly exclusive) access to rare earth metals will keep it on top for some time to come.

Their manufacturing technology is also arguably the most advanced in the world. We can't assume that another player would win if this were just a technological problem.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#19

Post by adventureful »

DanBC wrote: post #9
steve-howard wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason China beats us on cost is that their labor is cheap. If there is no labor, there's no way for them to beat us. Further, importation from China is not free.

There's no direct labour. But there's still labour. People have to program the machines, and then keep the machines stocked and running, and service the machines. At the moment that's skilled work and a small number of US workers will gain at the cost of a bunch of low-paid workers in poor countries. But it won't be long before that work becomes semi-skilled (see also sub-contract electronic engineering) and is done…

Intel is a perfectly good example of how robotic manufacturing works very well and scales.

If we can use robotics to mass assemble something as complex as a couple nanometer billion transistor chip, we can most definitely bring that to garments with some effort and scale it.

Intel can pump out a billion processors with probably a fraction of the employee count they have now (they have 100k total, but they're not all needed to just produce processors). That's intense efficiency.

Obviously the Intel example is a fairly ideal robotic manufacturing scenario. But the point is, that kind of ability will expand outward to all aspects of manufacturing as robotics leaps forward.

Re: Robot sewing machines could make 'made in China' obsolete

#20

Post by shykes »

adventureful wrote: post #6
stargazer-3 wrote: post #2

And what stops Chinese from making those machines?

Nothing, but they have everything to lose from them and the US (and other nations) has everything to gain, because the US has already completely lost the garment industry. China already has a massive supply of human labor, which is primarily why their labor costs are so low. If you were to automate their labor, it would cause substantial unemployment and or reductions in pay. I'd argue their society couldn't withstan…

I wonder how deeply this could transform the transportation industry: if the production of certain goods no longer require cheap labor, wouldn't production centers naturally move closer to demand to reduce transportation overhead?
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