Slashdot Mirror
New T-Shirt Sewing Robot Can Make As Many Shirts Per Hour As 17 Factory Workers (qz.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Quartz: In 2015, after years of research, SoftWear Automation introduced LOWRY, a sewing robot, or sewbot, that uses machine vision to spot and adjust to distortions in the fabric. Though initially only able to make simple products, such as bath mats, the technology is now advanced enough to make whole t-shirts and much of a pair of jeans. According to the company, it also does it far faster than a human sewing line. SoftWear Automation's big selling point is that one of its robotic sewing lines can replace a conventional line of 10 workers and produce about 1,142 t-shirts in an eight-hour period, compared to just 669 for the human sewing line. Another way to look at it is that the robot, working under the guidance of a single human handler, can make as many shirts per hour as about 17 humans. The company has emerged as a leader among those trying to automate sewing, drawing the interest of businesses that make home goods and of course clothing manufacturers, including Tianyuan Garments Company, a Chinese firm that produces for brands such as Adidas and Armani. Tianyuan Garments has invested $20 million in a 100,000-square foot factory in Little Rock, Arkansas, planned to open in 2018. The factory will be staffed with 21 robotic production lines supplied by SoftWear Automation, and will be capable of making 1.2 million t-shirts a year.
US production per worker is currently about $58,000, and seems to be going up by $10,000 per decade.
That's per capita, meaning "per person". If the per-capita output were distributed equally to every man, woman, and child everyone would have about $58.000 to spend. Each year. Including kids and babies. And they could do it again next year.
This will only go up as AI and automation take over. A huge number of driving jobs will be taken over by self-driving vehicles in the next decade (already happening with long-haul trucks), and AI and robotics will take over ever more of the production, working 24/7 and making more goods, more cheaply, and faster than humans.
We need to transition away from the current economic system real soon, or suffer massive riots and the downfall of our culture as unemployed people riot and take it down for us.
We need a way to spread the wealth out a little more evenly. UBI is one way, and we're getting really close to the point where UBI will be cheaper than the cost of government assistance plus the lost cost of higher crime and prison for the poor.
Perhaps taxing the robots and using the money to fund the rest of UBI would work.
We could also lower the SS retirement age, or go to a 4-day work week. Lots of options, many would work or could be made to work.
But we have to start transitioning just about now, or risk the downfall of our culture.