
Ask HN: If robots do all the work why do we need cheap labor from other nations? - FlowNote
I&#x27;ll be downvoted&#x2F;banned for using logic on HackerNews.  Dang be like: &quot;Please exercise proper and eloquent jurisprudence when manifesting combative narratives that might destabilize the rightful world view of my Silicon Valley paymasters. They really do mean well.&quot;
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quickthrower2
Robots are no where near able to do what people can do. You can give a person
instructions, train them, they can really understand the task, and have
excellent hand-eye coordination to carry out the task. If the task needs extra
strength or precision they might used tools, or even delegate some of the work
to robots (e.g. CNC machines, 3D Printers, moulds etc.). But overall we still
need people.

We don't 'need' cheap labor but the constant strive for more profits means
that the company that uses cheap labor will out-compete the ones that don't so
that everyone needs to.

Another thing about Robots. Let's say you could buy a robot to clean your
house for $250k, or pay a cleaner $10/hour, which would you go for?

The robot might be cheaper for cleaning a large enough house (that would
require 40 hours a week for a cleaner) over a number of years. Maybe if the
robot cleaned 3 such houses on rotation it would be worth it. But for most
people that capital expense is hard to bear.

For many people a robot is too expensive to invest in - they don't have the
cash at hand, but labor they can pay per hour and get going right away with
little upfront expense.

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cheap_labor
In short: Because they're cheaper than robots

Robotics and automation won't take over any job anytime soon. There are far
better alternatives for capitalist to make money without investing so much in
R&D.

Today we're pushing more automation than before because it started to be
expensive in some countries to build products (eg: China is far more expensive
than before now) or find cheap labor.

We gonna have a wide and diffuse automation only when the middle class is a
thing all over the world. Until we have wide economic disparity will be always
cheaper to hire foreigners and cheap labor from underdeveloped countries.

A few examples: in Japan robots are a thing more than in westerns countries
because their immigration policy is so strict that is very hard to find cheap
labor from other countries or provide them a visa. So they need an alternative
for jobs that nobody else want do (nursing)

US and Europe don't have this issue because they can afford to have immigrants
from Mexico, Philippines, other countries (for the first) and Africa, eastern
Europe (for the latter) that can take over the jobs that locals won't do
anymore (nursing, constructions, low paid jobs in general).

In the end, full automation will be very hard to be accomplished in a
capitalist society. More robots less jobs, less job more unemployment, more
unemployment less money, less money less consumerism, less consumerism less
profit, less profit less R&D, less R&D more cheap labor. The system will be
hard to be adjusted, even in the best case scenario you might have one
individual running an entire industry Not really the best for competition. We
already have monopolies in the new economy, with automation might be even
worst if regulators are not fixing the issue.

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anm89
"If robot's do all the work"

Nice straw man you've got there.

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jstewartmobile
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