Chinese Company Replaces Humans With Robots, Production Skyrockets, Mistakes Disappear

Zero Hedge ^ | 08/01/2015 | Tyler Durden

[SeekAndFind]

"I believe that anyone who has a job and works full time, they should be able to pay the things that sustain life: food, shelter and clothing. I can't even do that."

That rather depressing quote is from 61-year old Rebecca Cornick. She’s a grandmother and a 9-year Wendy’s veteran who spoke to CBS News. Rebecca makes $9 an hour and her plight is representative of fast food workers across the country who are campaigning for higher pay. 

The fast food worker pay debate is part of a larger discussion as "states and cities across the country [wrestle] with the idea of raising the minimum wage," CBS notes, adding that "right now, 29 states have minimums above the federal $7.25 an hour [and] four cities, including Los Angeles, have doubled their minimum to $15."

Proponents of raising the pay floor argue that it’s simply not possible to live on minimum wage and indeed, there’s plenty of evidence to suggest that they’re right. Opponents say forcing employers to pay more will simply mean that companies will fire people or stop hiring and indeed, as we highlighted on Friday, it looks as though WalMart’s move to implement an across-the-board pay raise for its low-paid workers may have contributed to a decision to layoff around 1,000 people at its home office in Bentonville. 

"The reality is that most business are not going to pay $15 dollars an hour and keep their doors open," one Burger King franchisee told CBS. "It just won't happen. The economics don't work in this industry. There is a limit to what you're going to pay for a hamburger." 

Yes, there’s only so much people will pay for a hamburger which is why Ronald McDonald has made an executive decision to hire more efficient employees at some locations:

With all of that in mind, consider the following from TechRepublic who tells the story of Changying Precision Technology Company, which has replaced almost all of its human employees with robots to great success:

In Dongguan City, located in the central Guangdong province of China, a technology company has set up a factory run almost exclusively by robots, and the results are fascinating.

 

The Changying Precision Technology Company factory in Dongguan has automated production lines that use robotic arms to produce parts for cell phones. 

 

The factory also has automated machining equipment, autonomous transport trucks, and other automated equipment in the warehouse.

 

There are still people working at the factory, though. Three workers check and monitor each production line and there are other employees who monitor a computer control system. Previously, there were 650 employees at the factory. With the new robots, there's now only 60. Luo Weiqiang, general manager of the company, told the People's Daily that the number of employees could drop to 20 in the future.

 

The robots have produced almost three times as many pieces as were produced before. According to the People's Daily, production per person has increased from 8,000 pieces to 21,000 pieces. That's a 162.5% increase.

 

The increased production rate hasn't come at the cost of quality either. In fact, quality has improved. Before the robots, the product defect rate was 25%, now it is below 5%.

So to anyone planning on picketing the local McDonald’s in an attempt to secure a 70% wage hike, be careful, because this "guy" is ready to work, doesn’t need breaks, and never makes a mistake:

Let’s just hope he doesn’t become self aware.

[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Never before have we been faced with the kind of technology that is already available or being perfected. There is almost no job that robots won't be capable of doing (or in many cases, are already capable of doing, but the price of robots is still too high to deploy them en masse). It might take 30 or 40 years before we reach that point, but it is coming.

The industrial revolution did cause massive disruption in society and changed society for the worse. Sure, society eventually "corrected," but the this time around the rules of the game won't be the same, because unlike in the past, no job is safe. People will survive no doubt, but the dignity inherent in labor will be denied to more people than ever before, sacrificed on the altar of the almighty buck. This is 1 Timothy 6:10 playing out on a societal level. This is not a Godly direction to take.

[tumblindice]

NUUMI: GM-Toyota in Fremont? Yeah, UAW thugs wrecked that attempt at success with sabotage.

[Chode]

must be that Marvel Mystery Oil...

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Luckily Rebecca has valuable marketable skills.

[Democrat_media]

WE are not doing much here in the USA.

This technology of robots is being developed in China.

so why are you saying WE? who is we?

[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

They run that contest every year(ish(?)) and every time the robots perform better. The current goal of making robots with the critical thinking abilities of a toddler is still a long way off, but that doesn't really matter. The technology that allows robots to perform complex tasks and to "learn" new skills is already available, even if the robot is dumb outside of its specific task.

Both the US and Israel (and maybe Russia) already have autonomy-capable weapon-systems (various drones and turrets), but between the horrendous PR and the fairly primitive capabilities of the systems ("is that a border-jumper or a goat-herder or a tumbleweed"), they aren't used as such. I think it will be sooner than a couple generations that they are deployed.

[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

"This technology of robots" is being developed everywhere. The Chinese are focused on industrial applications, but where do you think robotic surgeons are being researched and developed? Who has smart-drones and bomb-defusing robots are being used? And once it becomes economically feasible, every developed country will have robots doing half or more of the jobs. Hell, even India is trying to stay in the race to develop feasible robotic technology.

So to answer your question, "we" are the "we the people," the ones who will have to adapt to a society in which robots have displaced millions of workers from a huge variety of jobs.

[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Should be, “*Who has smart-drones and bomb-defusing robots already in use?”

[Democrat_media]

You can’t predict the future. A 5 mile meteor could strike the Earth next week and that could send people back to the stone age with a 100 or so humans alive.

[Democrat_media]

So what do you propose “we” do now? or what does an individual do to prepare for this?

[TexasGator]

“In-N-Out Burger has found a way to pay more than others for starting off, then increasing the pay very soon for employees.”

At In-N-Out they never stand around with mouths open and they can converse in English.

[Patriot Babe]

With a little makeup that little robot would come out looking like Chucky. =)

[2tipsea]

Yeah, I knew a guy who was hired as a manager there in the late 80’s. Very well educated, MBA from Wharton, and this plant was considered cutting edge for the automotive industry. He was very keen on how they ran things.

Later there were union problems, and eventually the government intervened somehow, I believe on behalf of Tesla, who ended up the new owner of the factory. Not sure if that’s considered a govt “buy out” but there was something very convoluted about it, according to my friend.

To be honest, I could not follow the confusing story of union/business/govt shenanigans, but then I don’t have an MBA!

[2tipsea]

So true! Or a Carrington Event.

[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

"So what do you propose “we” do now? or what does an individual do to prepare for this?"

That's the million-dollar question.

And while I can't predict the future, A.I. researchers at a Dutch university (can't recall which one) have predicted that Massachusetts will be the first US state to legalize human-robot marriage. It sounds preposterous, but people predicting legalized same-sex "marriages" in the 1980's sounded pretty preposterous too.

[Cloverfarm]

Where I work, they studied whether robotic welders or humans turned out more failed units.

Everyone thought the stupid humans were the ones messing up.

Not so.

[TexasTransplant]

I want a Robot that can mow the lawn so I can go fishing

[Enlightened1]

They have another name for that.... It’s call slave labor.

[Democrat_media]

Yes, this could happen next week, a meteor hitting the Earth:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Tl3P3BaWeA

so we can’t predict the future

[tumblindice]

They built the Geo Prism which was basically a Toyota Corolla.
But the UAW didn’t appreciate having to work like Japanese—productive, efficient, hardworking—so they started breaking things, and the Japanese finally said, “OK, we tried.” and left.