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Adidas To Sell Robot-Made Shoes In Germany (dw.com)
Adidas, the German sportswear and equipment maker, has announced that it will start marketing the first series of sports shoes manufactured by robots in Germany from 2017. Deutsche Welle reports: The announcement came as Adidas unveiled its prototype "Speedfactory", a state-of-the-art, 4,600 square-meter facility meant to automate shoe production, which is largely done manually in Asian factories at the moment. The company has struggled with steadily rising wages across the continent, where it employs around a million people. Still, Adidas insisted that the aim was not to immediately replace their workers, saying the goal was not "full automatization".
Soon we'll be able to 3D print our own pair of shoes and we won't need these Adidas boys or their robots at all.
Cause out of work factory workers sure aren't going to be buying them.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
The relevant news here is not that robot-made shoes are sold in Germany.
The actual news here is that Adidas moves part of its production of shoes, which previously was completely done in south-east Asia, back to Germany. And of course, that is reasonable to do for them only when almost all the work is done by robots, where there's no huge salary difference between doing it in China or Germany.
The low-paid workers in China were not really buying expensive Adidas shoes before, anyway. And Adidas employed no shoe producing workers in Germany before.
Decent wages hurt the stockholders.
As if any CEO was ever asked by his supervisory board "Cannot we pay decent wages?". They only get asked "Can you make us more profit?". Corporations by definition have no decency - there are only laws preventing them (not always) to take a shit on mankind.
Automation At Any Price
Former McDonald's USA CEO: $35K Robots Cheaper Than Hiring at $15 Per Hour
No, of course, the goal is to succesively replace its workers, so as to maximize profit. Robots get cheaper too over time. Buying too early doesn't make sense either.
Folks, whoever thinks profit maximization is about the rest of us is an idiot. Enhance the criteria by which our society works or prepare for very, very tough times.
Industrial Revolution 1760..1840 or thereabouts will look like a pleasant walk in the park in comparison.
I'm sure that the robot technicians in Germany will get paid reasonable wages.
I would also love to know why you can't afford to pay me more wages, Mr i_ate_god. After all, I deserve from you what I don't have. Please immediately redistribute your own wages to me.
Yeah, if those are the only two choices (they aren't though). There is a bare minimum to what quality of life that people should have. One of the things people should not have to do is work in sweat shops making shoes. If I have to give away part of my salary to make that happen, so be it.
Y'all don't know what it's like
Bein' male, middle class, and white
If you use the term "SJW" unironically, you're a tool.
They can. What makes you think they cannot? Just because they don't?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
There is a very nice upside of automation.
Without workers to screw over the CEO will not have any cheap ways to increase profits and no-one to blame when the company does something illegal.
Because they want to sell their products. If they would increase wages significantly (or more precisely, require that their suppliers do that), their products would become much more expensive than the competition. This is precisely why they transferred production from Europe to Asia in the 1980s - other companies (most notably Nike) were undercutting Adidas by selling products sourced from Asia at a lower price.
But the low-paid workers in China had a job. Now they don't.
Sure, but that's a problem Adidas cannot solve by keeping production sites in China. The workers would be replaced by robots in China - there certainly is a reason why German robot manufacturer Kuka was recently acquired by a Chinese company, and you've seen Foxconn replacing workers by robots, too.
I think the global issue of diminishing work due to replacement by robots will more likely be solved when production and consumption happen in the same country, so politicians can see "both sides of the medal" - cause and effect. Producing in country A and selling in country B on the contrary makes it less likely the problems of unemployment are solved.
The company has struggled with steadily rising wages across the continent, where it employs around a million people.
for the uninitiated, companies like Adidas manufacture shoes in asian countries under a system of Export Processing Zones or EPZ's. the EPZ is not under formal government control, is policed by the host countries military, and obtains waivers for any and all outstanding labor laws that may govern minimum wage or safety. EPZ's in the phillipines for example can force a 17 hour workday and hire women as young as 12. Young women are preferred as theyre uneducated and less likely to form a union or protest labor conditions in general. EPZ's that do successfully form a labour union are subsequently torn down and shipped out to other countries, with many of the middle managers that facilitate manufacturing Adidas and other shoes still managing the new workforce.
sweatshops have been a known problem for almost 40 years. What adidas is combatting is the fact that consumers are now able to give their brand an autopsy through the internet and find out just how much blood it takes to make a set of new sneakers. Consumer brands are different than products, because you are insisted upon to adopt the brand and its ethos. Once you become close to a brand, you relate to all its social norms and pretexts. People dont see a company anymore, so once it comes to light that an Adidas factory caught fire after a 16 hour shift with barricaded exists and no fire safety equipment, you as a consumer become collateral damage. the same psychological relationship used to relate the brand to you now applies to how you relate to the deaths of 150 workers. You, through brand identity, become a murderer.
that and to a lesser extent the declining influence and ability of -through repressive imperialist foreign policy- western nation states to exert and enforce networks of EPZ's at the behest of their respective shareholders. Robots are now a heck of a lot cheaper than overthrowing a government, installing a puppet, and murdering a labor rebellions leader.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I, for one, welcome our new sports shoe making robot overlords
And that's the bit that the current batch of BA-idiots doesn't get. Hell, even Ford knew that a hundred years ago: You have to have a market to sell to. You need someone who has the money to spend on the stuff you produce. Producing makes you poor, only selling makes you rich!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Why should they, they could just take a few pieces home every day and sew themselves a pair.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Dude, come down. You really think corporations need any "suggestions" from religious nutjobs to come up with something to lower cost?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Corporations by definition have no decency"
What is your definition of a corporation for you to say they have no decency? As a developer it is not my obligation to pay my cleaning staff more or pay a higher rent than my landlord requires. Is it my responsibility to pay more? If not why is it adidas' responsibility?
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
But the low-paid workers in China had a job. Now they don't.
Actually they still do. They won't have a job some time in the future, if the robotic factory works out.
Hooray for the SJW campaign against exploiting low-paid workers! No longer are those poor souls being exploited! Rejoice that the SJW elite's enlightened ways have scored a victory against capitalist exploitation of developing countries!
The has nothing to do with American politics, and everything to do with Asia's economic development. Companies like Adidas are simply running out of extremely low pay, exploitable workforces. The children of the people who have been working in sneaker sweatshops for the past 20 years are getting educations and aspiring to better jobs, better pay and better lives. Laying this at the feet of SJWs just makes you look unhinged, because this is one of the expected results of the exploitation of low wage jurisdictions; eventually, wages rise to an equivalent level to every other jurisdiction.
So how are those people expected to feed themselves and their families now?
Here's a hint: wages are rising because employers are competing for workers, so they'll probably go work somewhere else, most likely at similar wages, unless the jobs removed when Adidas shut down it's factories represent a large enough percentage of total employment to have a significant impact on the labour market.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
I would love to know why Adidas can't afford to pay decent wages?
No company wants to pay anyone anything. Ever. That's just how it works.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
I think the global issue of diminishing work due to replacement by robots will more likely be solved when production and consumption happen in the same country, so politicians can see "both sides of the medal" - cause and effect. Producing in country A and selling in country B on the contrary makes it less likely the problems of unemployment are solved.
You raise a very interesting point about onshoring manufacturing, although you didn't specifically say it: quality.
With robotic production, production quality can become almost a constant. So what differentiates a good made in Country A vs. Country B? We could go for tariff protections, but I hate the idea of rent-seeking governments inserting themselves into transactions merely to soak up money. The quality of the good is ultimately going to be determined by the precision of the robot; meaning how well maintained is that machine (bearing, sensors, hydraulics etc).
So the competitive advantage is going to go to the countries who are investing in training (essentially) mechanics. I don't think drag'n'drop programmers (see another /. story) are going to cut it in that world...
I would love to know why Adidas can't afford to pay decent wages?
This comment is hard to reply to, but I'll try.
The best thing to do would pick up an economics textbook used by any entry-level Macro Econ 101 course.
Basically, you have it backwards. We don't want companies maximizing pay - we want them minimizing cost. Cheaper shoes are good for everyone who buys shoes. The incentive structure for the company is such that they need to keep their production costs as low as possible. They also have incentives to meet demand. In a competitive environment, this meshing of supply and demand means we don't run into shoe shortages and there are plenty of affordable shoes to choose from. Jobs the wages associated will follow similar supply and demand rules. You can fiddle with the system if you want and pin wages, but this obviously effects the demand curve in a direction that you likely aren't going to be pleased with. Left alone, they system will dither (sometimes wildly) around the point of highest efficiency. For shoes, this is probably what we want. For food... well, the dithering is probably not desirable so we can probably afford to trade away some efficiency to avoid periods of starvation.
Now imagine your economic system, where we change the incentive structure to maximize wages. I'd like you to describe how this would work. I think by explaining it, you would find some holes all by yourself without any debate from me.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
"Adidas to Sell German-Made Shoes to Robots" - now THERE'S a story!
Dark Reflection
Corporations are legal entities, not humans. "Decency" is not a legal term, it has no meaning in the context of a legal entity.
If you, as a person, pay your cleaning staff poorly, people knowing this may think lowly of you, and as a human, you may therefore feel a lack of decency.
But a legal entity has no feelings, and thus no decency.
begging for handouts or planing a long stay in a jail / prison. At the very least you do get an doctor that does more then the ones at the ER do.
SJW? Wasn't she in Sex and the City?
Agree. A legal entity has no feelings. And is neither good nor bad as said entity. (Although the individuals in the company can do good or bad things.)
As far as I'm concerned my cleaning staff wanted X to clean the office. I'm paying X. I don't think about it anymore than I think about the landlord. They wanted a certain amount per month. I'm paying it.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
If it does. History shows layoffs are temporary in the long run of a free economy, though the granularity of the ups and downs may not be to everyone's liking. Hence the safety nets demanded by the population to ameliorate the rough edges of capitalism providing jobs and products.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
shazbot!
Adidas's GROSS profits are increasing. "Gross Profit" is total revenue--sales. Outside of the financial industry, "Gross Profit" is a weasel-word used to mislead people: we usually think of "profit" as "net profit," which is the gross profit minus operating expenses. This makes sense because operating expenses include wages (employee gross profits--net is minus taxes), supply line (other business's gross profits), and outsourced business services (again, other business's gross profits). If you put all business net profits together with all employee gross income, you get the total income.
Gross profits increase if your employee wages get more expensive and you thus adjust the price of your product. Your net profit can actually decrease under this situation, leaving your business with less money at the end of the year.
As for this:
I would love to know why Adidas can't afford to pay decent wages?
Businesses don't pay wages. Consumers pay wages.
Wages in aggregate across the entire production process are the base cost: at the end of the day, the product will absolutely sell for no less expensive than that. Volume deals push the price closer to the cost, such as when GM tries to bid for 100,000,000 tonnes of steel per year, and the steel mills contract with the coal and ore companies contingent on winning the GM contract, and everyone slims their profit margin because taking $1 per tonne on 100,000,000 tonnes is still $100,000,000 versus trying to profit $20 per tonne and selling 0 tonnes to GM. No matter how hard you compact that down--get it down to tenths of a cent per unit and 0.1% profit margins--you'll get no lower than the wage-labor costs of all employees involved in the entire supply chain.
Raise the wage-labor cost such that the steel costs $20 more per tonne and the price the steel mill will need to charge goes up by $20. With GM making passenger cars weighing 1.5 tonnes in steel, those cars cost $30 more. Either GM absorbs the cost in the form of lower profit margins (in which case, GM, as the consumer of steel, pays the wage of the steel mill) or GM holds its profit margin (usually 7%-13%; was -7.5% in 2013--they took a loss, which the big profit margins help protect against) and the end consumer pays for the wage raise.
In the case of Adidas, when shoe-maker labor increases, they can either raise prices or lower profits. Adidas's profits barely offset their loss years, with a five-year average of 4% and a five-year low of -7.5%. That means a 4% increase in labor costs--29 cents in minimum-wage increase in the United States, or a 14 cents increase on $3.50/hr Chinese labor--can put Adidas into permanent loss, ending in bankruptcy.
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But the low-paid workers in China had a job. Now they don't.
Sure, but that's a problem Adidas cannot solve by keeping production sites in China. The workers would be replaced by robots in China - there certainly is a reason why German robot manufacturer Kuka was recently acquired by a Chinese company, and you've seen Foxconn replacing workers by robots, too.
I think the global issue of diminishing work due to replacement by robots will more likely be solved when production and consumption happen in the same country, so politicians can see "both sides of the medal" - cause and effect. Producing in country A and selling in country B on the contrary makes it less likely the problems of unemployment are solved.
150 years earlier, when almost everyone lived and worked on a farm: "I think the global issue of diminishing work due to replacment by steam tractors will more likely be solved when politicians can see "both sides of the medal" - cause and effect."
Please, god almighty please, keep politicians away from command and control of the economy.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
so a corporation's profits are considered wages now? to whom?
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
Many Years ago I read a sifi novel about a planet with unlimited energy reserves and through the miracle of Sifi, the ability to fabricate anything. In the novel they had no concept of money. Everyone was able to choose their vocation, which they did out of altruism, or at least, a desire to not be seen as a free loader.
Start trek alludes to a no money society, but the various series are cluttered with Capitalistic enterprises (Ha!) and other examples.
Assuming that one day there is essentially no scarcity of essential materials (food, clothing, shelter, etc.), what structure do you believe a society would take?
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
> The Group’s gross profit increased 20% to € 2.304 billion (2014: € 1.918 billion) in the third quarter.
http://www.adidas-group.com/en...
I would love to know why Adidas can't afford to pay decent wages?
Maybe they're using more robots precisely because they want to pay their (remaining) human employees decent wages. :D
You don't like children working in sweatshops, but you also don't like it when those jobs are automated. It seems to me that a job that requires repetitive physical labor is *PERFECT* for automation. I'm surprised this hasn't happened decades ago.
Sure, if the workers are using their own creativity to make the products, then that would make sense, but I expect every Adidas shoe in every footlocker store everywhere to be assembled to the same standards. This happens better with robots than it does with humans.
Average incomes are falling. Surely this will lead to unwanted deflation since supply will exceed demand, forcing companies to lower prices to encourage more consumerism, but losing profits as a result, which will result in labor cuts, which will continue to decrease demand.
I'm not sure how sustainability comes into play here...
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
We don't want companies maximizing pay - we want them minimizing cost. Cheaper shoes are good for everyone who buys shoes.
I concluded the same when I designed my own economic theory *before* bothering to glance at formal economics. (It turns out modern economics are about measuring, and not about the function of an economy; I can generate and explain a lot of modern theories using my own as a sort of economic fundamental theory.) Most people don't understand technical progress and how it affects an economy; and they don't understand demand-side economics.
I've shown people how demand-side economics works, and drawn up a hypothetical scenario where we blockade China and bring Manufacture back to America. The *very* *first* *thing* you'll notice is we have 5.6% UE4 unemployment, and so we don't have the sheer labor to make all this Chinese crap; but that's naive. When you start doing the wage calculations and looking at how this change affects consumer buying power, you realize we don't have the buying capacity to purchase modern health care, IT services (cell phones, spotify, etc.), and other luxuries of the day, and so the middle class and the poor just get shitloads poorer. In the end, bringing those jobs back to America weakens the consumer's buying power so much that tons of logistics, shipping, and retail jobs go away; somewhere between 15 million and 40 million American jobs are unsupportable under that model.
That means cheap Chinese wages have created tens of millions of American jobs.
Nobody thinks in that way. They think, oh, the businesses should pay more wages, and not charge me for it... where are they going to get the money to pay those wages? Trickle-down economics: you work hard, you get an education, you start a business, and you become rich; everyone forgets you do it by making sure somebody else's job fails.
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Made by a robot?!? I generally find German made products are usually top notch (with a few exceptions such as cars). If our German made products (which you do pay a bit more for but worth it for quality IMHO) are made by robots, Will the quality go down, or stay the same. the answer to this could create a whole new debate in the manufacturing industry.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
We have built-in inflation thanks to the Federal Reserve System, so no we are unlikely to have deflation. If we do, things have gone very wrong.
Supply will periodically exceed demand, but then prices will drop below the level that companies can sustain and supply will become more constrained. If the market is fairly free, supply and demand should more or less align.
Similarly, your labor is only worth what it is worth. You can artificially prop it up, but this will distort the markets in a less-efficient direction. You get higher wages, but probably more unemployment and higher prices for all. As a whole, we are less well-off. Sometimes we decide that the trade-off is worth it (minimum wage). But it is incorrect to assume there is no trade-off.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
You might be surprised, but I actually agree with you that "free trade" is not healthy. I like free markets, but free trade can distort free markets.
In order to have a free market you need free movement of capital, free movement of goods, and free movement of labor. We have capital and goods covered with these free trade agreements, but we mostly ignore labor. I think the free trade agreements need to be adjusted to account for things like different labor markets. I don't know what the mechanism should be - perhaps some kind of a credits system - but almost any system would be better than just ripping out a third of the free market.
I'm not an economist and I agree that it is, at best, an observational science. With that said, the comment that I was referring to was either hastily composed or very, very naive.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Your description of gross profit is incorrect. Gross profit is revenue less the direct costs of producing those revenue. Direct costs would generally include labor costs for workers who produce shoes for Adidas as well as materials for the shoes, electricity to run the plants and depreciation on plant equipment. Net profit is gross profit less all other indirect costs. Indirect costs would includes things like design, marketing, advertising and administration.
Let's examine what you've posited.
"Adidas could sell their shoes at the current price and instead of retaining that giant profit, they could use that money to give to their employees. they could actually pay a higher wage and still make a profit without raising prices. just not as much profit."
OK, so now Nike comes in and makes more profit. Their stock price goes up. Adidas goes down. Nike finds it far easier to raise capital and takes market share from Adidas. Or they simply buy Adidas and now the "good" company with the high wages is completely gone.
Now we could talk about changing the incentives. Corporations are just a figment of our collective imaginations - in reality they are a way to protect owners from liability. We initially found them useful for getting large, risky projects done like bridges. We've continued to expand their scope and now view them as some sort of natural beast, but they are entirely creations of the government. We could, for instance, declare that corporations are all half-owned by employees. Poof! Just by definition. It would be very interesting to see how that would play out.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Provided you are still employed and can afford to buy it.
You're right. My business knowledge is slightly-less-complete than my economics knowledge. The rest still stands.
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I'm not sure I see how deflation can be avoided if income continues to decrease
People with less money, will spend less, encouraging retailers to lower prices, which will encourage those same retailers to cut labor costs, which will decrease further the supply of consumers.
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
I know what you mean, but my understanding of corps is that they are required to maximize profits by any legal means necessary. If a Corp deliberately lowers profits due to ethical concerns, or for any orher reason, their stockholders have grounds for legal action.
Some corporations aspire to higher levels of decency.
B Corps are for-profit companies certified by the nonprofit B Lab to meet rigorous standards of social and environmental performance,
accountability, and transparency.
The company I work for (as a software developer) is a B Corp.
You can find out more at https://www.bcorporation.net/what-are-b-corps
No. The following statement is incorrect: "If a Corp deliberately lowers profits due to ethical concerns, or for any orher reason, their stockholders have grounds for legal action."
.... (A million factors both ways).
:-) So why won't the Met's save money by hiring me.
Officers in the corporation have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders (Meaning they should be competent and not collude with vendors etc...) Cheap does not mean better from either a consumer or corporate perspective. There are always trade-offs. Do we off-shore to get closer to our customers, pay less in wages, pay less in taxes - but increase response time, lower productivity
If cheap was better than why do sport franchises (also a corp) pay millions for their athletes? Sh!t I'll play third base for the Mets and all I'll charge is $250,000/year. I'm much cheaper than David Wright.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
But one needn't be a B Corp to be ethical. Not everyone agrees with each point of those "rigorous standards."
Some companies ideas of decency and social performance mean not working on the Lord's Day, even if it means sacrificing sales (read profit). Chick Fil A and B&H Photo are two that come to mind.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Why did you delete this part from my quote: "If we do, things have gone very wrong."
It seems to me that the Great Depression counts as "gone very wrong".
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
The shoes of the future will not be manufactured in Asia or at sea. They will be manufactured in Germany, or possibly on top of a very tall mountain. In either case, most of the actual manufacturing process will be done by small robots. And as you go forth today remember always your duty is clear: To build and maintain those robots.
Most linux users don't know this, but the man pages were named after Chuck Norris. Chuck Norris fsck'ing hates noobs!
There is a very nice upside of automation. Without workers to screw over the CEO will not have any cheap ways to increase profits and no-one to blame when the company does something illegal.
But on the upside, once caught doing something illegal you can do a low level format of the CEO and upgrade to a newer version!
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
Simple: By increasing the money supply. Currently we do this through printing money and issuing debt. They are currently keeping the fed rate very low to keep inflation going. No one wants deflation because then hoarding cash becomes a viable investment strategy, which is good for no one.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
As was foretold in scripture.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Oh,no! This will cost thousands of children their thirty cents a day wage.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
We should protest against Adidas selling shoes made by oil-sweating robots! The poor droids should unite under a trade union!
The best thing to do would pick up an economics textbook used by any entry-level Macro Econ 101 course.
And read it with extreme scepticism as they are chock full of nonsense. Even better would be to pick up something like The Anti-Textbook or Debunking Economics which will point out the nonsense for you.
Corporations are just a tool to abstract away the financial and ethical liabilities of the owners and operators. "Corporations" don't actually do anything at all, including paying the cleaning staff well or poorly, because they are legal and not corporeal entities. A human, or several humans, ultimately decided what to pay the cleaning staff, even if they laundered the responsibility for that decision through the corporation.
It's the humans that are making decisions on behalf of the corporation that do or don't have decency, even if they try to hide behind the corporate veil.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
The quality of the good is ultimately going to be determined by the precision of the robot; meaning how well maintained is that machine (bearing, sensors, hydraulics etc).
So the competitive advantage is going to go to the countries who are investing in training (essentially) mechanics. I don't think drag'n'drop programmers (see another /. story) are going to cut it in that world...
The quality of the good is going to be determined by the quality of the input materials, the programmed tolerances, and the rigor of QC... just like it is now.
In a world where enough people cared about quality to let it affect their purchasing choices, your prediction may be true. In this world, where "cheap" is the only consideration, all of those parameters will be meticulously set by how cost effective (shoddy) a product can be and still be sold for an acceptable profit. The competitive advantage goes to whoever can operate at the lowest cost and cut the most corners.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
Thanks, those are good links. The "Debunking Economics" book looks like it is mostly critiquing classical theories which rely on equilibrium, as well as viewing debt as equivalent to expanding the money supply. I obviously haven't read it, but it could certainly have merit. On the surface, I agree with those things. One should probably still read some entry level econ 101 type stuff so that they at least understand supply and demand before delving into mathematical relationships. The other, "The Anti-Textbook" also looks interesting, though I don't think reading it would significantly change the content of my post. My post wasn't full of wonky mathematical formulas and predictions - just the very basics of supply and demand. If you don't know those basics, these books really won't make any sense at all.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
The answer to your question is the same reason YOU don't live on $10 a day and donate the rest to help starving people. You could easily do it. Live less luxuriously.
I'd like you to describe how this would work. I think by explaining it
Surprisingly most western nations do that. Only the USA seem to favour to have a 25% population at poverty.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
And I think you'll find that some of those nations are dealing with civil unrest as a result of some of these policies, which have resulted in massive youth unemployment. I mentioned tradeoffs - that's one of them.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Shouldn't a company hire the person who is willing to work for the least? They are probably in the most desperate situation. Hiring someone who doesn't really need the job that badly does less to reduce human suffering.
You mean like in Ferguson?
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Poof! You would get an "Alphabet scenario", where the CxO's are the only employees of the profitable corporation, and the real corporation is a fully-owned subsidiary that makes no profit.
If you then try to adjust the rules to cover this case, they will distribute the ownership between corporations owning one another in a sufficiently complicated manner that your rules won't apply.
Actually, I don't find this.
But feel free to point such nations out, so I get a clue.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Maybe you would also like to be more specific? I'm talking about such obscure nations as Italy and France. Italy has strong worker protections and 39% youth unemployment. France has 25% youth unemployment. The EU in general has stronger worker protections and higher youth unemployment than the US (~10%). You don't get something for nothing, and you can't wave a magic wand and make your country prosperous.
We have civil unrest in the US, too - lest I be accused of casting stones from a glass house. But we also have strong worker protections (except when compared to Europe), minimum wage, and a continuing problem with racially segregated neighborhoods. Most of our civil disturbances have been race related.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I think you could bat this down with a rule dictating ownership percentage of a parent corporation based on revenues of child corporation or somesuch. It's not like corporate accounting isn't already a nightmare. (I'm an advocate of getting rid of corporate taxes, BTW... too many funny games going on - just tax the owners.)
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I think there may be a wee more to Ferguson than youth unemployment.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Now those Asian sweatshop workers won't be "exploited" any more. They'll be unemployed.
That's quite the improvement, I'm sure they'll agree.
Thanks, defenders of the poor. Who are you going to help next?
Shall we warn the next unfortunate people who are about to become victims of your concern?
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Please define "afford" and "decent".
It'll be interesting to see if the second definition makes any reference to local conditions.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
There are reasons and that are very likely not related to worker protection laws or denmark and germany would look equaly bad.
The main reason is: we already live in a post scarity economy/society. But the society is not adapting or the economy is not. As you wish.
The next reason is, most countries have no well developed way to introduce pupils leaving school into the economy. E.g. journeymen as we do in Germany.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Germany is the only one below the US average so I think you are perhaps cherry picking a little. The worst state in the US is only as bad as the EU average.
I do agree that the issue is more complicated. But that doesn't really change my point, which is that artificially propping up salaries will have consequences. That much is not disputed by any serious economic theory that I am aware of. The decision to balance these consequences against the benefits is a political decision, and one which some countries in Europe are currently struggling with.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Salaries for young people leaving school and going to trade school and working in the companies where they are educated/employed are very very low.
You hardly get over $800 per month.
And then again, the numbers are about people who report in as unemployed. Perhaps in the US young people don't do that often as they get no welfare anyway?
The decision to balance these consequences against the benefits is a political decision, and one which some countries in Europe are currently struggling with.
Europe is struggling because of the huge discrepancies between the way economics work in different countries, e.g. look at Greece, Portugal, Spain versus e.g. Denmark or Germany. Some already want to set up universal basic income, others are so corrupt that basically nothing works there.
Worker protection and minimum wages have probably the most neglectible influence on our economics of all things you can blame ...
E.g. I won't employ anyone, regardless of wage. The paper work to employ one is already killing me. I contract out to my tax accountant etc. what I can, but an employee? No way, ever!
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
E.g. I won't employ anyone, regardless of wage. The paper work to employ one is already killing me. I contract out to my tax accountant etc. what I can, but an employee? No way, ever!
I would argue that the sort of bureaucracy that you are bemoaning is a direct result of government attempts to protect workers. I'm not making a judgement as to whether this is a good or a bad thing, just pointing it out. (Though if you want to turn this into a debate about the wisdom of such policies, I'm happy to indulge.) Even in the US where most employment is "at will", there is a fair amount of bureaucracy to cut through to "employ" someone. That is why it is becoming more common to "contract" with someone instead :) I myself am a contractor.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It's not at all about paying lower wages. With automation, Adidas will be able to customize their offerings to suite individual tastes and sizes. They can make tailor made shoes in a jiffy. They can set-up a small production center locally and replicate it anywhere across the globe without loosing consistency. It's about decentralization of manufacturing. That's what Adidas believes is the new paradigm in manufacturing. Instead of making shoes in one or two locations for the whole world and then shipping them across the globe, they plan to produce locally, perhaps in a location nearby to where you live. That way they will be able to custom make a pair of shoes for you or perhaps to match the tastes of people in your locality, and deliver in a day to your door-step. All these advantages are lost or 'difficult to achieve'/'very costly to achieve', by employing human labor.
I would love to know why Adidas can't afford to pay decent wages?
Speaking of decent wages and therefore avoiding automation, I think we shouldn't have had the industrial revolution in the first place.
Such as rampant entitlement? Every person should be allowed to act like a thug and beat up police officers and never expect to get shot for rushing at a cop in a threatening manner!
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
(euro) 2.304 billion / 1 million (workers) = 2304 Euro...ok, so where is that raise supposed to come from? Personally, I wouldn't see everyone getting a 2304 Euro a year raise as "paying decent wages" either.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
While there is a problem with respect for law and order in many poor communities, this whole thing is a two-way street. In addition to the reality of institutionalized racism and the occasional bad cop, we ask cops to perform a lot of duties which are counter to what a community wants their police to be doing. Ferguson is not a good example, because the officer in that case was doing exactly what he should. But in NY, they have local beat cops enforcing state cigarette tax laws. Pretty much everywhere, we have heavily armed troopers enforcing traffic laws that a camera could enforce, then using the "opportunity" to screen the populace for miscreants. Cops, no matter how great they are, are not immune to the effects of juggling too many different roles.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.