At the risk of getting political, a fair amount of the issue relates to the subsidies (both direct and indirect) made available to encourage companies to move to other regions.
The trouble would be how many of the jobs would actually be done by a human ? I watched an inside the factory program that was at The Kellogs factory . They said they had 28 operatives but quoted that only 4 of them where human beings ! It's the pure greed of the people at the top that is the main driver !
God knows what the future holds Ric. Weve got an ever growing population mixed with a drive towards more and more automation ! What happens if and when the autonomous Cars / Lorries take effect .? How many jobs would be lost then
Robotics and AI aren't going to go away, we will undoubtedly need fewer human beings in many industries. It isn't necessarily just greed, you can't and shouldn't stop progress in that respect. People will need to occupy their time in different ways and the way the economy works needs to reflect that.
I remember similar issues raised years ago with the introduction of automation, and yours truly was telling everyone the future was in the leisure industry, as clearly everyone would have much more time on their hands. Fortunately, everyone, including me did nothing about my predictions. Ultimately, a percentage of our time is spent working to pay for the labour saving devices that give us more time to go to work.
Employers like automation because robots don’t need paying, nor do they need holiday, overtime, NI, pensions or sick pay. They are reliable and don’t stop working because their kids school has shut or their childminder is sick or their gran has just died. They don’t get pregnant, nor do they strike or harrass other employees. They can work 24/7 without moaning about Working Time Directives or Heath and Safety at Work act. I’ll shut up because I’m talking myself out of a job here...
How long before the robots are ordering stuff ( made and packed by robots) off the internet and having it delivered to their doors by robots ? We're all ****ed then.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/uknews/5742146/inside-british-sex-doll-brothel/ Call her what you want she can't hear you. yet.
My dad was in the merchant navy for 36 years and worked at one point for Nissan taking cars from Sunderland to Immingham then Southampton then Bilbao. A number of years ago Nissan took a multi million pound bail out from the government then the next week finished all the British crew replaced with Russians.... Sailed from Southampton to bilbao arrived in port and buses full of Russians waiting for them. Brits off Russians on.... Police on quay in case of trouble, but no beef with the seaman just the company. Little to no reporting at time
A lot of the problem is people wanting everything cheaper, remember when if you shopped at Aldi or Lidl you were looked down on... Now these supermarket disruptors are mainstream and fashionable.... So your £1.50 tesco box of cereal is now 89p at Aldi. It's a race to the bottom and robots don't take a salary
Maybe Unlikely that more robots are involved in making Aldi cereal that Tesco though? And the cost of food reducing is surely a good thing isn’t it? Seem to recall they pay staff reasonably well too. Maybe they pay less staff which is a bigger issue? Whole system is ****ed though anyway until we have a completely new psychological relationship to work and profits etc. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that they should be no such thing as a billionaire? In fact thinking about it if no one was allowed to keep more than a billion unspent then maybe we’d finally find some people to buy City!!!
And the cost of food reducing is surely a good thing isn’t it? Not always, When it gets down to 10 "beef burgers" for a pound you really need to question what is in them. The constant race to be cheaper has to come at a cost. If you see what I mean?
Now we have the Government encouraging shopping on line, which means cheaper ? Why ? Warehouses full of minimum wage zero hours contract workers sorting out cheap imported stock to be delivered by minimum pay zero hour contract van drivers whilst the parent company move the cash off shore to avoid paying tax and national insurance etc thus contributing **** all. Pay by credit card, means no need for cash anymore, no need to be staffing High Street Banks, no need to visit the High Street. And Big Brother knows and controls your every move, God help our kids. ..