Discussion Random Discussion

[Bigsaints]

Take away the people who wipe down the tables at a shopping centre food court, replace the paper in a public toilet , bring in the trollys at supermarkets or any other mind numbing brain dead ' unkilled' job you can think of and the world would be a very filthy disorganized place.
A job is a job.

It's definately a miserable one.

 

[Plumber66]

I agree. But unless we introduce a living wage/basic income or something to counteract the vast numbers of forced unemployment we might be facing then I don't see how it works. People need money to survive and we are a demand based consumerist society that needs people to have jobs to spend money on shit to keep the rest of the population in a job. All I can see automation doing is stripping demand out of the system while sending more profit to the companies able to implement it.

Then we have governments intent on cutting taxes and welfare at all costs. What happens to the welfare system when tax revenues continue to fall while more and more people need it. Imo it'll take a massive shift in the way society distributes and shares wealth to overcome the problems we could face. But good luck getting that to happen.

It will never happen whilst our focus is on personal gains at the expense of others.

Ultimately it's fools gold that everyone is chasing.

 

[Plumber66]

Take away the people who wipe down the tables at a shopping centre food court, replace the paper in a public toilet , bring in the trollys at supermarkets or any other mind numbing brain dead ' unkilled' job you can think of and the world would be a very filthy disorganized place.
A job is a job.

I think we have to accept that not everyone is ambitious it really wants to improve their lot in life. So e are just happy to grab their wage and exist. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[crasha301]

Take away the people who wipe down the tables at a shopping centre food court, replace the paper in a public toilet , bring in the trollys at supermarkets or any other mind numbing brain dead ' unkilled' job you can think of and the world would be a very filthy disorganized place.
A job is a job.

I see in the fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables, slaves with white collars, advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of the history man, no purpose or place, we have no Great war, no Great depression, our great war is a spiritual war, our great depression is our lives, we've been all raised by television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires and movie gods and rock stars, but we won't and we're slowly learning that fact. and we're very very pissed off

 

[CALL ME SNAKE]

I think we have to accept that not everyone is ambitious it really wants to improve their lot in life. So e are just happy to grab their wage and exist. Nothing wrong with that.

And we have to remember that even if everyone on the planet was as smart as Albert Einstein somebody still has to bring the trollys in from the supermarket carpark.
Dont pity the peeps with the shit jobs, thank them.Somebody has to do it.
Be proud no matter what job you have.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

I see in the fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables, slaves with white collars, advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of the history man, no purpose or place, we have no Great war, no Great depression, our great war is a spiritual war, our great depression is our lives, we've been all raised by television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires and movie gods and rock stars, but we won't and we're slowly learning that fact. and we're very very pissed off

Yes the great challenge of the future is to fit more and more people into a world with less resources and feed them and keep them happy.
Ever played the old Microsoft Age of Empires? How does it end?

 

[crasha301]

Yes the great challenge of the future is to fit more and more people into a world with less resources and feed them and keep them happy.
Ever played the old Microsoft Age of Empires? How does it end?

I don't play computer games lol

 

[SaintsSeptember]

And we have to remember that even if everyone on the planet was as smart as Albert Einstein somebody still has to bring the trollys in from the supermarket carpark.
Dont pity the peeps with the shit jobs, thank them.Somebody has to do it.
Be proud no matter what job you have.

Its overpaid peeps with shit jobs that annoy me a bit.
For example there "are" people at car assembly plants who have negotiated very reasonable wages for themselves, and carry on about how trained they are in their jobs. Some of those jobs are easily learnt in a day. Pick up component , put screw in hole, tighten to pre-set torque using air tool. Repeat ad-finitum. Some of them are earning more money than , say a motor mechanic, which is a really challenging/complex job, but because of market pressures can't enjoy lucrative pay.
Then :..... they tell us the assembly plants are not viable.

 

[gringo2011]

Completely agree. We and other countries are going to have to try universal basic income at some point. I very much hope it works. I love my job and industry, so I'm happy to work until I drop, but if others can't find a vocation then I'm pretty happy that they play PlayStation all day.

In Europe there are no youth jobs even when kids get serious education behind them. Even here you are finding kids need a masters to get a foot in the door of the jobs that once were good enough with a BA. It's going to be a pretty interesting next 20 years with even doctors and lawyers being phased out. Already accuracy is higher with AI than by human. Kids should really be thinking about vocations that are not likely to be replaced by AI or able to be automated. The building industry will probably even eventually become more factory built and just need assemblers.

A lot of people find meaning from their careers so will be a huge adjustment to have leisure time..... if we are lucky enough to be still top of the economic pile. We should really be reimagining all the systems we have in place from education to the whole finance and capital system. They are vastly inadequate for the future that is being pushed on people.

 

[gringo2011]

Its overpaid peeps with shit jobs that annoy me a bit.
For example there "are" people at car assembly plants who have negotiated very reasonable wages for themselves, and carry on about how trained they are in their jobs. Some of those jobs are easily learnt in a day. Pick up component , put screw in hole, tighten to pre-set torque using air tool. Repeat ad-finitum. Some of them are earning more money than , say a motor mechanic, which is a really challenging/complex job, but because of market pressures can't enjoy lucrative pay.
Then :..... they tell us the assembly plants are not viable.

I'm sure there aren't that many in car assembly that are that well paid. A lot of it is system management with welding and painting etc done by robot or local assembly of asian components. The main issue with the whole system is in a global economy you can produce a car in Thailand for $3000 and it costs $10000 in Australia, without tariffs the Aussie one can't compete unless it offers something substantial better that people will pay for. The one thing you could say about government subsidy is that it limits companies need to innovate to survive so they always do what they have always done.

 

[gringo2011]

There is a constant flow of contractors going in and out of those plants just to service the plant.
The range of jobs they have is huge.
Chemists, Metallurgists, Engineering , the list is long.

The subsidies were a joke. It was like asking your child what it would take to turn up to school, kid says money.
Meanwhile we continued to make imported cars cheaper through poor trade agreements and decreasing import tariffs.
I'll give Trump one thing, he has stopped those bastards doing the same thing in the USA. He's already caused a couple of new mexican car plants to be cancelled.

Except the US have always bullied smaller countries and really driven a lot of the free trade and global economy reforms. Trump has actually just shifted one set of goal post to make another set. Just more corporate economic reform that will make huge profits for a few major corporations but maybe not the same ones. He's let the people believe the jobs will come back but in reality the US has manufacturing still they just made it all automated.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

I'm sure there aren't that many in car assembly that are that well paid. A lot of it is system management with welding and painting etc done by robot or local assembly of asian components. The main issue with the whole system is in a global economy you can produce a car in Thailand for $3000 and it costs $10000 in Australia, without tariffs the Aussie one can't compete unless it offers something substantial better that people will pay for. The one thing you could say about government subsidy is that it limits companies need to innovate to survive so they always do what they have always done.

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/holde...lian-exit-is-a-good-thing-20131214-2zdvv.html

I don't know how accurate this is. But its always been my understanding they are on a very nice wicket.
Where did you get your numbers from, i've never been able to get an accurate measure of the costs with breakdown between labour and purchased goods.
Part of it is overheads as well. Australia has been pretty good at keeping it down. Someone working as a buyer for example , would probably be degree qualified , but probably starts at a lower rate than what the article above describes. But that can get dicey too. When the supervisor gets payed less than his/her workers it creates all sorts of disharmony.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

Except the US have always bullied smaller countries and really driven a lot of the free trade and global economy reforms. Trump has actually just shifted one set of goal post to make another set. Just more corporate economic reform that will make huge profits for a few major corporations but maybe not the same ones. He's let the people believe the jobs will come back but in reality the US has manufacturing still they just made it all automated.

The organization i work for has manufacturing Mexico and USA. Essentially they were pushed into it by large customers. Similar level of automation. Lets just say we are sitting here at a distance expecting some turmoil over the medium term. Automation is not the be-all and end all.

 

[PoppedCorn]

Just make sure you lot and everyone else keeps drinking wine and spirit, in moderation of course, and my jobs ok
Cheers

 

[Persevering Saint]

And we have to remember that even if everyone on the planet was as smart as Albert Einstein somebody still has to bring the trollys in from the supermarket carpark.
Dont pity the peeps with the shit jobs, thank them.Somebody has to do it.
Be proud no matter what job you have.

From Martin Luther King, to a bunch of junior high-school kids in Philadelphia, 1967:

"And when you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don’t just set out to do a good job. Set out to do such a good job that the living, the dead or the unborn couldn’t do it any better.

If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well.

If you can’t be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley.
Be the best little shrub on the side of the hill.
Be a bush if you can’t be a tree.
If you can’t be a highway, just be a trail.
If you can’t be a sun, be a star.
For it isn’t by size that you win or fail.
Be the best of whatever you are."

 

[CALL ME SNAKE]

From Martin Luther King, to a bunch of junior high-school kids in Philadelphia, 1967:

"And when you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don’t just set out to do a good job. Set out to do such a good job that the living, the dead or the unborn couldn’t do it any better.

If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well.

If you can’t be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley.
Be the best little shrub on the side of the hill.
Be a bush if you can’t be a tree.
If you can’t be a highway, just be a trail.
If you can’t be a sun, be a star.
For it isn’t by size that you win or fail.
Be the best of whatever you are."

I waiting for some smartarse to say " but stars are suns".

 

[Persevering Saint]

I waiting for some smartarse to say " but stars are suns".

 

[StCicatriz]

I agree. But unless we introduce a living wage/basic income or something to counteract the vast numbers of forced unemployment we might be facing then I don't see how it works. People need money to survive and we are a demand based consumerist society that needs people to have jobs to spend money on shit to keep the rest of the population in a job. All I can see automation doing is stripping demand out of the system while sending more profit to the companies able to implement it.

Then we have governments intent on cutting taxes and welfare at all costs. What happens to the welfare system when tax revenues continue to fall while more and more people need it. Imo it'll take a massive shift in the way society distributes and shares wealth to overcome the problems we could face. But good luck getting that to happen.

nailed it!

here's some jobs from 5 seconds of thought that wont be there in 10-20 years:
- anything involving driving a vehicle (so couriers, taxi, bus drivers etc.) as that's currently being automated and there are already businesses using automated vehicles
- brick laying (already equipment being trialed to do that)

then you have reductions in the number of jobs for professions like journalists/print media etc.

 

[gringo2011]

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/holde...lian-exit-is-a-good-thing-20131214-2zdvv.html

I don't know how accurate this is. But its always been my understanding they are on a very nice wicket.
Where did you get your numbers from, i've never been able to get an accurate measure of the costs with breakdown between labour and purchased goods.
Part of it is overheads as well. Australia has been pretty good at keeping it down. Someone working as a buyer for example , would probably be degree qualified , but probably starts at a lower rate than what the article above describes. But that can get dicey too. When the supervisor gets payed less than his/her workers it creates all sorts of disharmony.

I actually just imagined them as an example of why it's hard to compete using local labour which runs through everything from transport to wages. I have never actually seen figures that break it down either. In the old days the auto assembly workers were above award but never insane money. The auto industry has actually gone pretty much the way of most industry and culled a lot of the work force and frozen wage rises for a long time. My brother in law studied engineering and did a few years at Holden and the pay was pretty shit across the board there unless you were part of the board. Another friend works for Toyota Australia and they run a super tight ship with direction coming from Japan.

 

[Nutsngum]

I waiting for some smartarse to say " but stars are suns".

Technically there is only one sun, our star.

 

[gringo2011]

nailed it!

here's some jobs from 5 seconds of thought that wont be there in 10-20 years:
- anything involving driving a vehicle (so couriers, taxi, bus drivers etc.) as that's currently being automated and there are already businesses using automated vehicles
- brick laying (already equipment being trialed to do that)

then you have reductions in the number of jobs for professions like journalists/print media etc.

There are already programs that you enter raw data in them that write sports articles and they are already published in the US apparently.

 

[gringo2011]

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/holde...lian-exit-is-a-good-thing-20131214-2zdvv.html

I don't know how accurate this is. But its always been my understanding they are on a very nice wicket.
Where did you get your numbers from, i've never been able to get an accurate measure of the costs with breakdown between labour and purchased goods.
Part of it is overheads as well. Australia has been pretty good at keeping it down. Someone working as a buyer for example , would probably be degree qualified , but probably starts at a lower rate than what the article above describes. But that can get dicey too. When the supervisor gets payed less than his/her workers it creates all sorts of disharmony.

I can't imagine they were paying the line workers that money. My brother in law worked at a tool hire company while he studied at uni and was on less at Holden as a graduate engineer with a dual commerce engineering degree. It sounds like crap to me unless they were operators of the computerised equipment that is actually very much a programming job and as such a specialised job. When I was young I studied furniture design and did a further course in setting up large scale manufacturing plants and while they eliminate all the workers someone has to set the systems and in furniture it's pretty much converting CAD on to flat panels. Cars are a lot more complex and would add further dimensions to the same processes.

 

[Plumber66]

Maybe we need a different approach to how people get paid, like shares in the company or profit result based bonuses?

Workers also need to appreciate the nuances of the economic cycle.

A gorgeous d start would be initial training for kids, so that they enter the workforce e skilled up.

That we have to import skilled labour is a national shame.

 

[Periphery]

nailed it!

here's some jobs from 5 seconds of thought that wont be there in 10-20 years:
- anything involving driving a vehicle (so couriers, taxi, bus drivers etc.) as that's currently being automated and there are already businesses using automated vehicles
- brick laying (already equipment being trialed to do that)

then you have reductions in the number of jobs for professions like journalists/print media etc.

Add any pick/packing jobs to that. Also wouldn't surprise me if a shitload of building jobs went as more and more of the building process was prebuilt in largely automated factories. It's only a matter of time till the technology gets cheap enough to make automation the better option for a hell of a lot of jobs (even skilled ones).

Maybe we need a different approach to how people get paid, like shares in the company or profit result based bonuses?

Workers also need to appreciate the nuances of the economic cycle.

A gorgeous d start would be initial training for kids, so that they enter the workforce e skilled up.

That we have to import skilled labour is a national shame.

Workers co-ops are a potential game changer. But it'd require a significant shift in the way people view companies/work to make it happen. There are some really interesting large scale overseas examples (the names of which I forget but there's a big one in spain).

 

[SaintsSeptember]

Just make sure you lot and everyone else keeps drinking wine and spirit, in moderation of course, and my jobs ok
Cheers

Gee thats a tough ask.
OK i'll do it just for you PC.