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China Aims to Retool Its Manufacturing Industry with Robots

18 points| cpeterso | 10 years ago |technologyreview.com

11 comments

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[+] vixen99|10 years ago|reply
"China is laying the groundwork for a robot revolution by planning to automate the work currently done by millions of low-paid workers."

Any ideas about what China has in mind for those 'millions of low-paid workers'?

[+] hackuser|10 years ago|reply
> Any ideas about what China has in mind for those 'millions of low-paid workers'?

I think China is a special case: The legitimacy of the whole political system, not just the current leader, depends on their ability to deliver economic satisfaction to their population. Major dislocations of low-skilled workers who probably lack the wealth or safety net to endure long-term unemployment could be risky.

On the other hand, without political reform how will the masses make their voices heard and have their interests addressed? Chinese leaders have a long history of treating them like chattle, from what I understand.

[+] rmah|10 years ago|reply
The same thing that every other nation that used to have armies of low paid workers (e.g. USA, England, Germany, etc, etc) did.
[+] viperscape|10 years ago|reply
Beat me to it, this article completely disregards the lost wages for employees. Perhaps China will become the first country to begin wage replacement. As technology, robotics and automation grows, more will find themselves with out jobs and perhaps unable to start anew.
[+] yc1010|10 years ago|reply
Same way western economies work? Create debt and more debt and base whole economies on sale of houses to one another. When it all fall apart double down
[+] hackuser|10 years ago|reply
An interesting thought on automation from Bob Work, who heads the Pentagon's long-range planning for robotics and automation on the battlefield. I don't know that it's true or how broadly it applies, but it's something to think about regarding how automation is conceived of in different cultures:

I will make a hypothesis: that authoritarian regimes who believe people are weaknesses ... that they can not be trusted, they will naturally gravitate toward totally automated solutions. Why do I know that? Because that is exactly the way the Soviets conceived of their reconnaissance strike complex. It was going to be completely automated. We believe that the advantage we have as we start this competition is our people [1]

The Pentagon's research and current planning is that human-computer teams are much more effective than either alone, in many situations.

[1] http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2015/12/pentagon-nervous-a...

[+] ZoeZoeBee|10 years ago|reply
It would have been a lot easier to simply take the blue pill, if anyone honestly believes this does not all come to a head I wish you the best in your blissful ignorance
[+] loaaa|10 years ago|reply
how about their workers? a lot of people will loss jobs because of robot