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Outsourcing, the reality

 
 
 
Loren Pechtel said:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/manufacturing-jobs-are-never-coming-back/

The trend is reversing--but to automated plants in the US. Automation is the real job-killer, not outsourcing.
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We will still be able to adapt to training people to maintain the software and hardware involved. This is not a problem. The problem is when the work is sources out to countries where people work for a penny because they are in countries that failed to develop as fast as Europe and the US did. Then the taxpayer will have to pay even more for those out of work.
 
12 million people are in manufacturing. Let say 200mil are in the work force. So it's only 6%. Manufacturing is already tiny part of the economy.
 
Global economies are in the process of being disrupted by automation and are going to need to continually adapt over the next few decades. Tech is advancing quickly.
 
Also these jobs that are retuning are not the ones that need a lot of human interaction. Transportation and material costs are also a factor.
 
barbos said:
12 million people are in manufacturing. Let say 200mil are in the work force. So it's only 6%. Manufacturing is already tiny part of the economy.
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Want to increase manufacturing employment? Give a shove to 3D printing technology. Soon every wanna be manufacturer would be acting like those little brick factory enthusiasts back in the day, setting up shop.
 
dismal said:
Smash the looms!
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My sentiment, exactly. (The sarcastic version, that is.)

Entire occupations were made redundant due to industrialisation, but society adapted, and the benefits of an industrialised economy far outweigh the costs incurred during the transition to it.

Automation is the same; many occupations will go the way of the blacksmith and the stonemason. At the same time, we will continue to invent new jobs for people to do; new ways to make use of people's energy.

My occupation didn't even exist until the mid 90's, and the niche market I serve didn't exist ten years ago.
 
bigfield said:
dismal said:
Smash the looms!
Click to expand...
My sentiment, exactly. (The sarcastic version, that is.)

Entire occupations were made redundant due to industrialisation, but society adapted, and the benefits of an industrialised economy far outweigh the costs incurred during the transition to it.

Automation is the same; many occupations will go the way of the blacksmith and the stonemason. At the same time, we will continue to invent new jobs for people to do; new ways to make use of people's energy.

My occupation didn't even exist until the mid 90's, and the niche market I serve didn't exist ten years ago.
Click to expand...

Although I think it is conceivable that the brunt of human need could eventually be served by automation, meaning that many people just become irrelevant to production, similar to what happened to horses when cars were invented.
 
whichphilosophy said:
Loren Pechtel said:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/manufacturing-jobs-are-never-coming-back/

The trend is reversing--but to automated plants in the US. Automation is the real job-killer, not outsourcing.
Click to expand...

We will still be able to adapt to training people to maintain the software and hardware involved. This is not a problem. The problem is when the work is sources out to countries where people work for a penny because they are in countries that failed to develop as fast as Europe and the US did. Then the taxpayer will have to pay even more for those out of work.
Click to expand...

Did you miss the part where a lot of that manufacturing is coming back to the US?

It's just coming back as automated plants, not a bunch of low-skill workers.

Yes, people can work at building and maintaining the automation--but those are high skill jobs, the people that were doing the factory work are probably not suitable for such jobs.
 
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