What I love about CNC

Exactly. And that is a very good thing, and it is inevitable in competitive environment (if you did not switch to this machine, you would be put out of business). I personally love that sort of stuff that does things automatically, with all my heart.

In the past "industrial revolutions", displaced workers could find other jobs. I kind of agree with Lloyd who said something similar to this and gave some examples of what people still have to do manually to make stuff.

What I am not so sure about, is whether the past lessons apply to the future.

I think that automation went so far, that most people with the IQ below some level can be replaced with computers. (say, IQ of 85 now). In the past, they could always have a job, like answering a phone or working on a conveyor or whatever. And now a computer could do all that work.

That alone could be worked out, maybe we can somehow keep such people afloat in one way or another. But what about 20 years later, when computers could displace workers with IQ under 90? 95? etc?

I am very bothered by this and am worried what kind of society my kids will live in. Of course, I want them to be in the better part of society, but in any case I am worried and who knows how they will turn out.

Also, I do not think that it is only a future issue: I think that the increasing disparity in pay, and stagnating salaries of low income employees, are due to the above described process of people being displaced by computers.

i i i

Right.

Lloyd, but in a real high production factory (not one offs), they could have robots doing the assembly and packing, no people required.

And if software evolves, the same factories could do one offs from CAD files or some such. Mass production of one offs, so to speak.

(...)

That's already happening with PC boards. You send your Gerbers off to an aggregator and he nests your boards with those of many other designers all on to the same panel. When sufficient are accumulated, boards are made and shipped. It's cheap.

--Winston

This issue has been the subject of study and speculation for a long time in the field of labor economics. Until the late '70s, it was assumed by many that work weeks would keep getting shorter while incomes grew -- the result of improving automation and its consequence, which was lower production costs. That was a time when the US was headed toward social democracy. Gunnar Myrdal's _Beyond the Welfare State_ (1960 or so) was sort of the guidebook for social democratic thinking.

Alas, work weeks stayed the same. Part of the problem is that we grew out of our houses trying to store all of the crap that we made and bought. d8-) But the big issue was that we were never inclined to control the disposition of capital. Now, with globalization, it would be impossible to do so.

Back in the mid-late 1980's a co-worker told me about his training on sharp copiers. The first human to touch the copy machine was after the after the box was opened. But I'll bet they employed some maintenance technicians to keep the automatic equipment working. I think Cliff was obsolete when they came out with the magic 8 ball :-)

RogerN

I heard that the Japanese plant that makes robots (was it Motoman? or Fanuc) runs completely lights out,someone stops by once in a while to sweep the dust etc. I am sure tha tthey need engineers and repairmen, though. I can try to dig up some info.

Looks like it is Fanuc.

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I think your model of a gradually-rising lower threshold on IQ will prove incorrect in the long run. Much manual labor is mechanically complex and expensive to automate. From a business point of view, computers can be more profitably aimed at the many medium-pay, medium-IQ jobs, rather than the many low-paying, low-IQ jobs or the few high-paying, high-IQ jobs. In any case, as computer memory and cpu cycles drop in cost, more and more office jobs will be at risk.

Only in the bogus case that there is infinite demand for cabinets. The net loss of labor doesn't happen to be at your shop, unless your competition gets a better robot than yours and underbids you for the undoubtedly finite number of cabinets needed in your area. Then you need to get a better robot than they have, or kiss business goodbye. Eventually somebody ends up with as much cabinet robot as the market will bear, and everybody else is out of business.

Tom Gardner wrote: ... And, the machine tracks

Adult people don't bitch about "privacy" when they're using their employer's equipment - the boss has the right to do whatever he wishes to do with his own property!

But unions are nothing but a bunch of crybaby extortionists.

Thanks, Rich

You would prefer to be able to screw your employees and none can even speak about it

And you expect these screwed employees with no voice to be loyal?

How many employees do you have? Or are you on welfare?

jim wrote: ..

So, you think "not being allowed to steal" is being "screwed?"

You're a symptom of the disease that's destroying America.

GFY Rich

My response may well be the symptom but you apparently are the disease

Remind me. where did I say something about stealing?

I will tell you this much I would never go to work for a company that had union employees It tells me a lot about the employer

It tells more about the corrupt unions than anything else.

Frequently where the unions are you find that there were no problems with the employer, but rather low skilled workers who were gullible enough to be scammed by union recruiters into joining the union and paying union dues while not seeing any actual benefit.

I recall seeing some reports where workers are some large foreign owned auto plants in the US were cheering after once again defeating attempts by a corrupt union to impose themselves on the workers. Unions hate these non union competitors and will do anything and everything they can to cause trouble at such plants, since these plants are proof that unions do not benefit the workers.

Some unions may be corrupt but many employers are corrupt or incompetent Unions exist where employees are treated like chattel If a business can't get along with its workers and goes out of business as a result that is just one consequence of free market economics

employees don't vote for unions where there is already good communication The japanese automakers have numerous plants in the US and those assembly plants aren't unionized No unions because the employees think unions are not needed to communicate

Toyota has in profitable years paid their assembly plant workers better than Detroit UAW workers And Toyota workers would join a union in a heart-beat if Toyota treated there employees like GM has

Unions are a waste of productivity but they are a necessary evil when you have bad management

Nah your not even close. Unions don't impose themselves on anybody Employees can choose by democratic elections to have an agent represent them. Do you think movie stars have agents forced upon them? If the union exist it is because the majority wants it to

These plants are evidence of good management They are evidence of good lines of communication between employee and employer those plants have gained market share because they are more productive And team work is the biggest part of that

Nobody likes working for incompetent management

I used to make instrument panels and housings from aluminum sheet. I used to mark out the general outline with Dy-Kem, just to prevent dumb errors and then cut it with the handwheels on my 1938 Bridgeport. Due to differential wear in the center of the Acme screws, screw holes would not line up, etc.

Then, I got a set of Bridgeport optical readouts with the mirrored scales and projection viewer boxes, and suddenly, when I made something that had a cover that went on it, the screw holes lined up without filing! That was great, but it was still REALLY tedious to cut out a dozen slots manually. if I went past the dimension a little in one place, it would leave a big gouge and I had to start over.

Now, with CNC, I don't spend hours slaving over one panel and worrying that one little slipup will ruin the part.

I don't run my machine unattended, but then the pieces I work on typically don't take very long to make, generally just 3-5 minutes per part. Most of the time is preparation, setup and cleanup.

Jon

Which brings up a related question: how do you fixture those panels?

That's what the door is for.

Thanks, Rich