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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:You do see how is it rude to conflate last century's enemies of capitalism who sought to use automation to reduce oppression of all, with modern king of capitalism who seek to use automation to have maximum oppression of workers though, yes? What the heck is this claim from?
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Oct 2, 2018 02:58
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PT6A posted:Or what if there's only a 1% chance of something going seriously wrong and people/robots need to work in the same area at the same time frequently? Having all the robots shut down is possible, but it would massively reduce productivity. Yet a 1% chance of serious injury is far too much. A protective cage is a far better solution in that situation. Also, he didn't say it was a transmitter, or only a transmitter, it could have a passive device of some sort with the powered detector on the robots (which could also allow them to self-test).
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Oct 2, 2018 03:52
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OneEightHundred posted:It's hard to say without knowing the specifics of how it's used, like what other safety systems are in place and how the warehouse is operated. This video doesn't explain the vests or anything but it goes into detail exactly how the robots work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KRjuuEVEZs I strongly imagine the vests are "an alarm goes off and every robot freezes if you cross this line". Just looking at how things are I can't even imagine a person walking around while stuff is running, there isn't even a place they could walk. The robots take the full width of the lanes around the stacks and move super erratically with no signaling in the larger "highway" part. It'd be like a worker trying to walk on a moving conveyor belt to get somewhere. You can see the zigzag warning lines on the floor and they look like "if you cross this line you will literally die" lines, as well as red boxes on the floor that are probably "this is where you should be". I would strongly imagine the vests are set that if you cross one or the other of those lines a thing goes off and everything stops dead.I can't imagine it's individual robots that would stop compared to just stopping everything or some quadrant or something if you cross the red or yellow lines.
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Oct 2, 2018 04:28
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Balliver Shagnasty posted:Soooo......Sears is still dying, like a grandfather in hospice. Stock's even reached Dollar Menu status. What's up with that? Sears' is less from general retail collapse and more from the CEO actively destroying the company out of incompetence. Some of Eddie Lampert's greatest hits: - Kenmore (the house appliance brand) and appliance sales in general were separate divisions and compete. The appliance sales division gets higher bonuses for selling non-Kenmore appliances - For a division to use Sears' internal IT or HR required a formal contract with competitive bids from outside vendors - Sears sold most of their stores to a real estate holding company and then rented the space back He's lost huge amounts of money on it, but is still rich enough that it won't impact his day-to-day life at all.
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Oct 2, 2018 04:29
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:This video doesn't explain the vests or anything but it goes into detail exactly how the robots work: That's kind of a terrible safety system. If a vest has to actively signal "Everybody stop", there's no indication when the vest is broken unless there's a nearby robot that you happen to see keep moving. Or if a robot is broken and ignoring the signal, there's no way to know unless you happen to see it coming (at which point there's nothing protecting you) People can't be trusted to obey angry floor lines. There's a long, long history of accidents that show that people will do things that are idiotic in hindsight. I guarantee you that "worker trying to walk on a moving conveyor belt to get somewhere" has happened. You're in a hurry, you do something a little dangerous, but are careful and everything is fine. Then you do it again and are a little less careful since it was fine last time. Repeat until you're unlucky and lose a hand.
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Oct 2, 2018 04:43
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Foxfire_ posted:- Sears sold most of their stores to a real estate holding company and then rented the space back Not just any real estate holding company. Eddie Lampert's holding company! 
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Oct 2, 2018 04:48
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less than three posted:Not just any real estate holding company. Eddie Lampert's holding company! He sold it from himself to himself, and in the process lost another several billions of dollars of value on the whole deal though. Normally when corrupt CEO loots company like this, they come out ahead on the self-dealing. It is truly a mystery how he messed it up.
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Oct 2, 2018 04:56
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Are we sure we're not missing some part of Lampert's exit strategy on Sears?
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Oct 2, 2018 04:58
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Discendo Vox posted:Are we sure we're not missing some part of Lampert's exit strategy on Sears? If he had an exit strategy, then he would have been out 5 years ago.
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Oct 2, 2018 05:02
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His bet is that the real estate will be more valuable once he can get the Sears stores off of it. Either way, I'm still baffled that there hasn't been a shareholder/creditor lawsuit since he's pretty much intentionally loving them all over.
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Oct 2, 2018 05:03
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Foxfire_ posted:That's kind of a terrible safety system. If a vest has to actively signal "Everybody stop", there's no indication when the vest is broken unless there's a nearby robot that you happen to see keep moving. Or if a robot is broken and ignoring the signal, there's no way to know unless you happen to see it coming (at which point there's nothing protecting you) I mean, it looks like the primary safety system is that you'd have to climb a row of shelves or a row of moving robots to even get to the floor then cross a bunch moving stuff and then the stacks are blocked by robots that take up 100% of the width so you'd be able to see you absolutely would not physically be able to get to whatever place you decided you should go that is against the rules.
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Oct 2, 2018 05:18
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OneEightHundred posted:His bet is that the real estate will be more valuable once he can get the Sears stores off of it. Either way, I'm still baffled that there hasn't been a shareholder/creditor lawsuit since he's pretty much intentionally loving them all over. If I recall correct, ownership structure is such of Eddie Lampert and his close friends own supermajority of Sears voting rights/shares. And also a huge amount of creditor to Sears is Eddie Lampert's other companies which done poorly as well, and he fully controls them. So there is no one left to contest him anymore. Many former big investors sold out of Sears involvement long ago.
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Oct 2, 2018 05:33
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Discendo Vox posted:Are we sure we're not missing some part of Lampert's exit strategy on Sears? At the end they tear his mask off and it turns out it was none other than the sole heir to the Big Lots fortune all along.
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Oct 2, 2018 05:42
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:I mean, it looks like the primary safety system is that you'd have to climb a row of shelves or a row of moving robots to even get to the floor then cross a bunch moving stuff and then the stacks are blocked by robots that take up 100% of the width so you'd be able to see you absolutely would not physically be able to get to whatever place you decided you should go that is against the rules. If a worker wanted to climb over all that poo poo they could it isn't physically impossible. If there's a way then given enough time someone will do it. The vest thing could work ok for just roaming the floor assuming the workers are following other protocol and could reduce the need for dedicated pedestrian rights of way; but it would be absolutely unacceptable for maintenance issues where workers need to access things within any danger zones. That's when you need a proper emergency stop setup to stop the machinery for an accidental intrusion into the danger zone and lock out tag out if you need to actually work on it. A lot of people gloss over basic safety issues like that but there's a reason why SOP for this stuff is the way it is; people had to die and be maimed for it to come about.
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Oct 2, 2018 06:46
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Raldikuk posted:If a worker wanted to climb over all that poo poo they could it isn't physically impossible. If there's a way then given enough time someone will do it. Especially given that employers constantly pressure people to do things faster in a 'I don't care about the details, just do it' sort of way, meaning they don't exactly order someone to do dangerous poo poo, but the threat of punishment sits over them if they don't circumvent safety procedures.
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Oct 2, 2018 07:20
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FCKGW posted:At the end they tear his mask off and it turns out it was none other than the sole heir to the Big Lots fortune all along. Am I missing something about Big Lots? Is that just as hosed, too?
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Oct 2, 2018 09:40
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I thought the joke was just that Big Lots would just take over their vacant retail space? Except that I think Sears stores are usually a lot bigger than what Big Lots uses.
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Oct 2, 2018 11:09
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:He sold it from himself to himself, and in the process lost another several billions of dollars of value on the whole deal though. There is zero mystery. He tried to run the business by Objectivist principals, and was willing to shovel money on the fire to try and make it work and prove that his skills as a Captain of Industry were beyond reproach. He had an early career success on Wall Street and has spent the last decade plus convinced that means he's a genius who should be able to Always Succeed. Also, his personal net worth topped out at ~$3.1 billion, and he's worth just under $2b now. Not a huge personal loss, and much of it is in the nosedive of Sears Holdings stock, which he owns ~28% of. Liquid Communism fucked around with this message at 11:27 on Oct 2, 2018 |
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Oct 2, 2018 11:15
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Lampert basically views himself as a suave vulture capitalist guy who can maximize ROI, except that unlike actual vulture capitalists like Carl Icahn or Paul Singer, he's not very effective at buying distressed debt/equity for bupkus, stripping out the assets and moving on - instead, his ego has caused him to create bad money investments by sinking more than he should have, so even if he ends up ahead at the end of the mess, he's lost money that he didn't have to lose if he wasn't a loving moron.
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Oct 2, 2018 11:37
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Liquid Communism posted:There is zero mystery. He tried to run the business by Objectivist principals, and was willing to shovel money on the fire to try and make it work and prove that his skills as a Captain of Industry were beyond reproach. He had an early career success on Wall Street and has spent the last decade plus convinced that means he's a genius who should be able to Always Succeed. His holding companies and investment firm used to be worth ~$7 billion. They have plummeted down to around $1 billion and lost most of their clients. So, he has lost way more that just his "personal" net worth.
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Oct 2, 2018 12:54
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huh, 15 dollars
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Oct 2, 2018 13:10
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Yup: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/02/amazon-raises-minimum-wage-to-15-for-all-us-employees.htmlquote:Amazon announced Tuesday it's raising the minimum wage for all U.S. employees to $15, effective next month. quote:Amazon said it will also start advocating for an increase to the federal minimum wage. Cicero fucked around with this message at 15:35 on Oct 2, 2018 |
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Oct 2, 2018 15:22
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Cicero posted:Yup: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/02/amazon-raises-minimum-wage-to-15-for-all-us-employees.html Why does well-known communist agitator Bezos want to destroy the US economy with unaffordable minimum wages 
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Oct 2, 2018 15:24
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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Obviously Amazon can afford it, but $15/hour probably would be unreasonably high in some cheap/rural parts of America for other types of businesses. A federal law that tied minimum wages to something like cost of living for a given county/region would make more sense imo. This would also have the side effect of "encouraging" people to be less NIMBY assholes, since insane housing prices would also mean really high minimum wages.
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Oct 2, 2018 15:38
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Balliver Shagnasty posted:Am I missing something about Big Lots? Is that just as hosed, too? The joke is that it's a retail competitor. That was the funniest one I could think of. I was going to say KMart but Sears owns them too.
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Oct 2, 2018 16:26
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Cicero posted:Obviously Amazon can afford it, but $15/hour probably would be unreasonably high in some cheap/rural parts of America for other types of businesses. A federal law that tied minimum wages to something like cost of living for a given county/region would make more sense imo. It really, really isn't unreasonable anywhere in the country. It just looks that way because the profit extraction to make shareholder value machine that is our current economy has successfully sold the narrative that labor costs are what is limiting businesses.
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Oct 2, 2018 16:29
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It seems like its worked pretty well out here. Even the surrounding suburbs of Seattle, all the entry service jobs start at 14 now. QFC, Burger King, and they can't actually get staff, they have to pay more to actually hire. Then again, it's probably still not enough to live on in this area now.
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Oct 2, 2018 17:02
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BrandorKP posted:It seems like its worked pretty well out here. Even the surrounding suburbs of Seattle, all the entry service jobs start at 14 now. QFC, Burger King, and they can't actually get staff, they have to pay more to actually hire. Then again, it's probably still not enough to live on in this area now. For comparison, it's about what Devin Nunes' family has to pay undocumented immigrants in rural northern Iowa to get them to work their dairy farm for them.
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Oct 2, 2018 19:00
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My dad has 40 years in grocery retail and some store management experience in FL. His hourly was around 16 last I checked.
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Oct 2, 2018 20:53
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Liquid Cannibalism posted:It really, really isn't unreasonable anywhere in the country.
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Oct 2, 2018 22:57
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:What the heck is this claim from? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technocracy_movement I'm frankly surprised you don't know.
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Oct 2, 2018 23:07
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Cicero posted:I'd like to believe this, but I've seen some poor rear end parts of the country. It can be hard to imagine setting the wage floor that high for areas that just don't have that much going on, economically. I've seen some very poor parts of several countries, but speaking purely for the US I cannot see less than $15 an hour being a wage that allows oneself to live with dignity and security anywhere in the nation, especially given the US's piss-poor health care system. I'm not trying to troll you and I presume that you mean well, but I'm tired of people acting as if $15 an hour is ludicrously generous when it doesn't come close to keeping up with the increasing rate of production and wealth creation in the US over the years. This is slightly unrelated, but people also need to realise that not everyone is a bloody family... there are a lot of people out there who live alone, only want to live alone and are not going to partner up. Sharing the burdens of living with one's significant other is perfectly fine, but not everybody pairs off and people seem to think that everything is calibrated for two people in an intimate relationship cohabitating, possibly with children. Trying to live alone on a single income these days is becoming almost impossible, and nobody seems to care because FAMILY! is a buzzword that every dumbass politician throws out to appease the ignorant masses. What people also need tor realise is that everything done and any reforms made are just putting a bandage on a gushing wound. Higher minimum wage, basic minimum income and all of that is just trying to plaster over the cracks in a system that isn't sustainable. BrandorKP posted:My dad has 40 years in grocery retail and some store management experience in FL. His hourly was around 16 last I checked. The truly sad part about this is that I would have guessed significantly lower, even in a high CoL state like Florida where energy costs are high because one has to run the AC all of the time or risk dying from the oppressive heat. Nothing personal against you or your father, but I've lived in the South and it's like being constantly smothered with a wet blanket that someone just took out of the microwave.
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Oct 2, 2018 23:14
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Cicero posted:I'd like to believe this, but I've seen some poor rear end parts of the country. It can be hard to imagine setting the wage floor that high for areas that just don't have that much going on, economically. Even if this were somehow true (and I seriously doubt that it is), what percentage of the country are we talking about? How many people live in these areas that are somehow so economically turbofucked that a $15/hour minimum wage would destroy them? Federal policy that is almost universally beneficial shouldn't be held back by weird as hell edge cases. If they do exist then you find a way to provide aid to those communities, because their problems clearly have nothing to do with the affordability of a minimum wage hike.
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Oct 2, 2018 23:16
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There is no minimum wage based solution to a capitalist society trending towards a post-labor economy due to being highly subject to automation. The labor of too many cannot be acquired at a cost that makes sense in a capitalistic society, and trying to force it without other support structures in place is perhaps the worst possible outcome for those laborers who find themselves competing for fewer and fewer positions with all the ramifications thereof save depressed wages. Basic living conditions must be provided for directly by the government. Trying to force businesses to pay people more than they're worth does not accomplish this goal effectively at a societal level.
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Oct 2, 2018 23:33
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baquerd posted:There is no minimum wage based solution to a capitalist society trending towards a post-labor economy due to being highly subject to automation. The labor of too many cannot be acquired at a cost that makes sense in a capitalistic society, and trying to force it without other support structures in place is perhaps the worst possible outcome for those laborers who find themselves competing for fewer and fewer positions with all the ramifications thereof save depressed wages. This presumes that a minimum wage of $15/hr would be paying "people more than they are worth" which is pretty dubious. But beyond that, why can't we do both? Seems like we can expand the social safety net AND mandate higher minimum wages. If minimum wage had kept pace with inflation then it would be drat near $20/hr now. You can look at various metrics like productivity and corporate profits and see that plenty of money is being made by businesses. We can also see that all of these gains have been funneled to the 1%, so maybe the issue isn't that $15/hr is unprofitable, or that it is "more than they are worth", but that the wealthy are greedy?
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Oct 3, 2018 00:05
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Raldikuk posted:This presumes that a minimum wage of $15/hr would be paying "people more than they are worth" which is pretty dubious. But beyond that, why can't we do both? Seems like we can expand the social safety net AND mandate higher minimum wages. Yes, the wealthy are greedy, but consumers in many market segments are highly price sensitive and will favor businesses that have the lowest prices. In order to make more wealth, wealthy businesses owners will cut labor as soon automation becomes cheaper in order to control costs/prices. Raising the minimum wage makes automation more affordable relative to the increase. This cuts the number of available jobs in price sensitive markets due to increased automation, leading to higher unemployment and significantly poorer outcomes for those whose available jobs have been eliminated unless some new market can absorb these displaced laborers. As a personal anecdote, I recently saw people crowded around automated ordering kiosks at McDonalds even with available cashiers standing there ready to take orders. These were not a novelty at this location, indicating to me that many consumers even prefer the elimination of these human interactions.
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Oct 3, 2018 00:26
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Cicero posted:Obviously Amazon can afford it, but $15/hour probably would be unreasonably high in some cheap/rural parts of America for other types of businesses. A federal law that tied minimum wages to something like cost of living for a given county/region would make more sense imo. Keep in mind that washington state passed a $13.50 minimum (gradual, it's 11.50 right now, 12.00 next year, then 13.50 in 2020) and the cheap/rural parts of the state have yet to show any sign of poo poo hitting the fan for them.
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Oct 3, 2018 00:28
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baquerd posted:Yes, the wealthy are greedy, but consumers in many market segments are highly price sensitive and will favor businesses that have the lowest prices. In order to make more wealth, wealthy businesses owners will cut labor as soon automation becomes cheaper in order to control costs/prices. Raising the minimum wage makes automation more affordable relative to the increase. This cuts the number of available jobs in price sensitive markets due to increased automation, leading to higher unemployment and significantly poorer outcomes for those whose available jobs have been eliminated unless some new market can absorb these displaced laborers. They already cut labor, wages, and benefits; automation or not. And historically minimum wage increases don't translate to increased unemployment. Consider the fact that minimum wage has been going down in real terms and yet, automation is still increasing, jobs are still being lost. Automation is something that itself will keep progressing and getting cheaper, regardless of minimum wage increases and there will always be tipping points where the automation gets good enough and cheap enough to replace workers. Displaced workers are always going to be a problem, and this is regardless of minimum wage. And in fact, the area that will be hardest hit by automation is poised to be white collar workers; people who aren't making minimum wage. Rather than present minimum wage as the boogie man for all of this and suggesting that not increasing it will save jobs from automation, we can instead just expand those safety nets? And maybe we can realize that automation will affect many industries and jobs that pay well so maybe those people who will be displaced from those well paying jobs (maybe we should set a maximum pay here to prevent this???) will need help as well. And of course the crux of the problem is: "In order to make more wealth, wealthy businesses owners will". We get back to the greed of the wealthy; maybe we should address the out of control wealth inequality?
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Oct 3, 2018 00:54
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$15/hr is the floor at which most people can start paying all of their bills and getting their poo poo together enough to advance themselves without being supported financially by someone else. It is not a generous amount of money by any stretch. More of this.
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Oct 3, 2018 02:08
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baquerd posted:Yes, the wealthy are greedy, but consumers in many market segments are highly price sensitive and will favor businesses that have the lowest prices. In order to make more wealth, wealthy businesses owners will cut labor as soon automation becomes cheaper in order to control costs/prices. Raising the minimum wage makes automation more affordable relative to the increase. This cuts the number of available jobs in price sensitive markets due to increased automation, leading to higher unemployment and significantly poorer outcomes for those whose available jobs have been eliminated unless some new market can absorb these displaced laborers. I'm going to accept that this is a good-faith argument and that you aren't pulling the bullshit from some pages ago. That said, any wage is too much when machines work for free. Eventually a lot of routine tasks are going to be automated which, in a not-horrible society, would be joyous news. It doesn't matter if you freeze the minimum wage for decades, remove it entirely or cut it to $1 an hour... $1/hour is still too much compared to a machine that works for free. Keeping wages down might slow the process by a few years, but it's going to happen anyway because an order-taking kiosk works for free after you buy it, 24 hours a day. Even if you freeze wages at $7.25 an hour, which is still the minimum in much of if not most of the US and is nowhere close to a living wage literally anywhere, a 24-hour free labour kiosk is going to replace a worker eventually, whether it costs $360 to employ that worker for 24 hours, or $174 or just $24. Do what you like, you're just kicking that can down the road which is admittedly a frequent tactic in both economics and politics. Trying to keep wages down is just delaying the inevitable, increasing human misery and harming market economies because it puts less money in the hands of people who would spend it on frivolous things such as shelter, heat, medical care and, God for-loving-bid, the occasional cheeseburger. Edit: I just realised that I basically said the same exact thing as Raldikuk, just worse.
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Oct 3, 2018 02:31
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