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Foxconn replaces '60,000 factory workers with robots' (China)
BBC ^ | 5/25/16 | uncredited

Posted on 05/25/2016 11:05:03 AM PDT by RightGeek

Apple and Samsung supplier Foxconn has reportedly replaced 60,000 factory workers with robots.

One factory has "reduced employee strength from 110,000 to 50,000 thanks to the introduction of robots", a government official told the South China Morning Post.

Xu Yulian, head of publicity for the Kunshan region, added: "More companies are likely to follow suit."

China is investing heavily in a robot workforce.

In a statement to the BBC, Foxconn Technology Group confirmed that it was automating "many of the manufacturing tasks associated with our operations" but denied that it meant long-term job losses.

[snip]

Since September 2014, 505 factories across Dongguan, in the Guangdong province, have invested 4.2bn yuan (£430m) in robots, aiming to replace thousands of workers.

[snip]

(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: apple; china; foxconn; hitech; honhai; ipad; iphone; ipod; robots; samsung; taiwan; terrygou
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To: baltimorepoet
watched this one video ISIS published online where they had an Iraqi Army officer dig his own grave.

Talk about being unmotivated. The strategy there would be to dig extremely slowly, if not at all. When they threaten to shoot you if you don't dig faster, simply tell them - then you'll wind up having to dig it.

21 posted on 05/25/2016 12:26:47 PM PDT by PGR88
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To: PGR88

If it were me... I would have given them the 1OO1. (the double-middle finger while mooning them)


22 posted on 05/25/2016 12:29:40 PM PDT by baltimorepoet
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Comment #23 Removed by Moderator

To: baltimorepoet
If it were me... I would have given them the 1OO1. (the double-middle finger while mooning them)

NOOOO. These are Muslim Jihadis we are dealing with here. They will see that as an invitation to gay sex. So you'll get that, and then get shot. Talk about adding insult to injury....

24 posted on 05/25/2016 12:45:59 PM PDT by PGR88
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To: henkster

I worked for a Midwest based electronics recycling and resell outfit that was a step above sweatshop labor and I have some sympathy for those poor worked to death people.


25 posted on 05/25/2016 12:46:49 PM PDT by wally_bert (I didn't get where I am today by selling ice cream tasting of bookends, pumice stone & West Germany)
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To: PGR88
NOOOO. These are Muslim Jihadis we are dealing with here. They will see that as an invitation to gay sex. So you'll get that, and then get shot. Talk about adding insult to injury....

Good point. Also a good reason why to never dress up like a goat of sheep in the Middle East. Then again, celebrating Halloween in the Middle East would probably be a bad idea, also.
26 posted on 05/25/2016 1:07:32 PM PDT by baltimorepoet
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To: RightGeek

Read the articles about Wendy’s here in the US. The $15 an hour thing is forcing them to do the same in all 1600 stateside restaurants probably cutting their HR in half.

red


27 posted on 05/25/2016 1:15:39 PM PDT by Redwood71
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To: RightGeek

Union robot workers, unite!


28 posted on 05/25/2016 1:17:19 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: RightGeek

Don’t tell my boss about that robot!


29 posted on 05/25/2016 1:29:02 PM PDT by Kommodor (Terrorist, Journalist or Democrat? I can't tell the difference.)
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To: RightGeek; ~Kim4VRWC's~; 1234; Abundy; Action-America; acoulterfan; AFreeBird; Airwinger; Aliska; ..
Earlier posting I did not see: Over 60,000 workers displaced by robots at non-Apple FoxConn factory in China. The digital automation revolution is happening far faster than anyone expected. The economic repercussions will be enormous. Robots are NOT consumers of the tech devices they will be making. — PING!


Apple
Ping!

The latest Apple/Mac/iOS Pings can be found by searching Keyword "ApplePingList" on FreeRepublic's Search.

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me

30 posted on 05/25/2016 1:34:15 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue..)
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To: vette6387
So if China is already resorting to robotic assembly, why not just do it here and save the transportation costs?

Transportation costs of the completed product are the least of the price. . . It's the ability to get the components to the assembly plant that are the sticking point. Many of those are made around the world and in China and getting all of those to the assembly point in a timely matter in a just as needed inventory system is a problem in the US.

31 posted on 05/25/2016 1:37:19 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue..)
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To: Jim Robinson
I read that they pay only 2% in corp taxes in China vs whatever it would cost here.

Jim, I think you may be hearing the propaganda being spread about the corporate tax rate in Ireland, which is actually Ireland's Capital Gains tax rate, not their income tax rate, not China's Corporate Income tax rate. China's Corporate tax rate is lower than the US rate, but it is still substantial. Their personal income tax and payroll taxes are lower, however.

Here is a chart showing the Chinese Corporate Taxation rate over the past few years:


China's Corporate Tax Rate — Source.

This chart does not show any tax incentives that may have been given to any particular company for locating in China, however.

32 posted on 05/25/2016 1:46:22 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue..)
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To: henkster
Foxconn has a reputation for literally working its employees to death; very high suicide rate. They figured that robots won’t commit suicide.

That is absolutely FALSE henkster. At the time of a suicide spate at FoxConn in 2010, there were a total of 18 suicides among the entire FoxConn workforce of 750,000 workers in a period of 18 months.

The suicide rate among rural youth in the USA is 20 per 100,000, and almost 11 per 100,000 in the cities. Do you know what the suicide rate was among all of FoxConn's 750,000 young workers at the peak of the suicide spate in 2010? I'm betting you do not. If you did, you wouldn't be posting this tripe. It was 1.5 per 100,000! I doubt you would find ANY group of 750,000 people anywhere in the world with that low of a suicide rate!

The suicide rate among students at Ivy League Universtites such as Yale and Harvard in the USA is more than five times as high as the workers at Foxconn. . . you have fallen for a FUD campaign against Apple. . . when the fewer than eighteen employees among FoxConn's vast employee numbers killed themselves in their off-hours, not while working, over an eighteen month period. Yes, you read that right, an average of one per month out of 750,000 employees!

In the years following, that spate of suicides which occurred spread over 26 factories (although six did occur in one factory), FoxConn's suicide rate fell even further with one year, 2013, seeing ZERO suicides among a workforce of over 1.5 million workers.

One of the reasons attributed for this drop was the fact that FoxConn CEO was persuaded to stop paying the families of suicide victims a condolence payment equivalent to between 15 and 25 years of the suicide victim annual pay out of his own pocket.

Once workers realized they could not benefit their families more by their deaths than by continuing to work and send money home, they stopped killing themselves.

These are facts, not propaganda promulgated by China Labor Watch, the organization which is headquartered in New York City, and publishes the false claims you repeated, using them to raise funds that never reach the workers in China.

33 posted on 05/25/2016 2:01:51 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue..)
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To: Swordmaker

Well I stand corrected. Yeah Foxconn.


34 posted on 05/25/2016 2:17:30 PM PDT by henkster (Don't listen to what people say, watch what they do.)
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To: riverdawg

LOL wonder if they know that. Anymore the Chinese people are apt to riot than knuckle under. Theyve had a taste of capitalism and theres just no going back. China is far from a commie done deal anymore. The happy daze of Mao are long gone.


35 posted on 05/25/2016 3:01:13 PM PDT by 556x45
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To: dhs12345
A lot of this kind of work cannot be automated,

Sounds like China needs to develop an illegal alien system like we have.

36 posted on 05/25/2016 3:34:44 PM PDT by Menehune56 ("Let them hate so long as they fear" (Oderint Dum Metuant), Lucius Accius (170 BC - 86 BC))
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To: RightGeek
This dovetails with what I just heard about some Chinese conglomerate trying to buy German robotics firm KUKA. I hope the bid is rejected.
37 posted on 05/25/2016 3:43:34 PM PDT by Moltke (Reasoning with a liberal is like watering a rock in the hope to grow a building)
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To: 556x45
Whats the Chinese govt going to do what thousands of unemployed factory workers?

Give them rifles and point them at (choose one or more)

a) Russa
b) Japan
c) India
d) Viet Nam
e) The Philippines
f) Australia
g) Canada (without the rifles; make like Syrians going into Europe))

38 posted on 05/25/2016 8:01:36 PM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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To: RightGeek
And of course he assembly lines will be staffed by "iRobots":


39 posted on 05/25/2016 8:04:07 PM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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