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Absolutely right, but western industry learned back in the 80's that if you do that, the assembly job becomes so simple that humans can do it even faster than robots!


That must explain why the auto manufacturers have thrown out all the robots and put human beings back on the line. Anyone else notice that cars have become longer lasting, and less expensive to own since robots were introduced?
 
That must explain why the auto manufacturers have thrown out all the robots and put human beings back on the line. Anyone else notice that cars have become longer lasting, and less expensive to own since robots were introduced?

You make a good point, but it's a question of manufacturing tolerances.

Car assembly is more forgiving. Consumer electronics less so. Tiny handheld consumer electronics even less - and then Apple heaps even more demanding tolerances on top of that (as the original story explains).
 
Of course, it depends on the dexterity, accuracy and capability of the robot.

As noted in the story, the Foxconn devices are not meant for this exact purpose.

On the other hand, Philips Electronics, for example, uses super modern assembly robots at some of their plants. They say the new robots are able to build any product, including ones that required humans just a couple of years ago.
 
Probably comes under section 8:

"To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;"

A referee can't regulate. A referee applies (or, makes sure of the application of) the regulations.
 
I'm other news Samsung buys 1st generation robots from Foxconn to build new line of Galaxy phones.
 
I said this a while ago. Sadly, a life in China isn't the same the world over. A 16 year old girl is always going to do this job cheaper in China.

If I were Emperor of the USA, I would say that if a company sells 50% of their goods in the USA, at least 50% of the goods must be manufactured in the USA. If not, 75% tariff on 100% of goods sold in the USA. Take America back!!!!!!!

Right! And no one would buy them because they would cost too much. Back in the 50's, 60's, and 70's, all TVs were made in the USA. Then the masses chose to switch to TVs made in Asia because they were just as good for less cost. This is why General Motors is starting to move their production to China. Toyota and Honda are cleaning their clock.

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If robots build the iPhones, will they be moved to the US?

Not a chance. People in the US aren't willing to jump through all the hoops Apple throws their way. Consumers want more, now! US workers aren't willing to work 80 hour weeks when needed to meet consumer demand. Would you be willing to wait several weeks or a month or more for Apple to correct a production problem? We want it NOW!, not when some union boss says I can get it.
 
What is hard to believe is that people still think Foxcon workers are getting slave wages.
$2.50 hour. Tops. That's based on the customary 40 hour work week and 36 hours of overtime. (Which they all want to work because life in the "dorms" is so miserable).

And the "cost of living" is low because they can't afford to buy anything.

More ignorance doesn't support your arguments. Show any sound statistics that indicate a suicide rate higher in Foxcons plants vs all of China.

Yes indeed. Communist China. What a wonderful place to live. LOL!

Dude, you can put all the lipstick you want on the fairy-tale life of a Chinese Foxconn worker but at the end of the day, they are simply slaves to a brutal government-controlled economy.
 
American workers didn't get greedy, that's Fox News nonsense. It's just that the prevailing wages in China are SO low, that it makes more sense to manufacture there. American workers just plain could not afford to work for $1/hr or whatever it is they pay the Foxconn workers. We do live in a world economy now, much more so than even 50 years ago, and we'll have to cope with that. Eventually there will have to be a world government and world laws as well, but that's a whole other discussion.

A world government is the long term goal of the elite of Europe that George Washington stood against.
 
For the sake of those who use these units:

0.05 mm = 0.002"

0.02 mm = 0.001" actually 0.0007874

That smaller number is usually what a dial caliper is marked with. I think digital ones generally show the same with a 5 or nothing after the number to indicate if it's closer to the next significant digit higher or not.

Machining is a lost art these days, but one that I learned when I was younger. The accuracy of a robot is a collection of tolerances with additional complications of repeatability, maintenance, etc. I would guess that the move to robots has more to do with eliminating a source of defects than reducing labor cost. Labor is really cheap. My father was an engineer for a US company that had a factory in China. One of the process lines he set up he came back to check up on after about six months of operation. Out of the dozen or so workers on the line, they had added one more who's job was to stand there all day with a wooden mallet. Occasionally the convey belt would freeze up and his job was to give it a wack when it did to get it moving again. Like I say, labor was cheap.

Something tells me Apple is leaning more toward the robot than the wooden mallet, regardless of where things are being built.
 
You're a very short-sighted Emperor who is ignorant of the inevitable retaliation that occurs when you implement protectionism.

Doing what you suggest, economic protectionism, leads to trade wars and hurts more than it helps. Basically, you'd create a bunch of menial, low-wage jobs in America and take those away from China. Sounds, great, right? Well, sorta great because they are low-quality jobs. But hey, that's better than no jobs, right?

But then China gets pissed about this, because low-wage menial manufacturing jobs are the main thing they are competitive with on the world stage, so they inevitably retaliate. First off they'll switch from buying Boeing planes to buying Airbus planes. Asia and China in particular is one of the largest growth markets for the airline industry, so this is super bad. Boeing has to lay off thousands of people. Congratulations, you've traded high-wage, high-quality American Boeing jobs across several states for low-wage menial manufacturing jobs.

So then the US gets pissed and, I dunno, puts a huge tariff on imported memory chips (something we've actually done in the past), because that also hurts China and it protects US chip manufacturing. But since most memory chips aren't made in the USA, there isn't enough supply so most chips are still imported, just at higher cost, and now all computers, tablets, smart phones, etc. cost an extra $100.

So Japan gets pissed at the chip tariff and counteracts by slapping a tariff on American apples, cherries, and potatoes. Now Washington and Idaho farmers are really hurting too. But good thing you've got those ultra crappy menial jobs assembling iPhones like robots in the USA, jobs that Americans don't even like to take in the first place, which is why immigrants almost always fill the ranks of produce pickers, meat processing plants, and the like.

I could go on and on. This isn't theoretical. This is exactly what happens.

If *I* were Emperor I would encourage American competitiveness for high-wage, high-quality jobs by further supporting education, promising start-ups, high-tech business, and advanced sciences.

Manufacturing jobs build wealth and what does china have that we cannot take from them?

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The loophole being, your $199 phone on a two year contract now costs $399 and over $1000 for the unlocked version. Greed is what sent the jobs to China.

It was more than just greed.

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You realize that MOST countries have protectionism in place?

China, Japan, Germany, etc. all have big tariffs on American products. You are either in a trade surplus or deficit. America is in a deficit and that's not good. It's only good for short term, cheap products but bad for a country and it's citizens in the long run. So enjoy your $20 DVD player. You'll pay for it ten-fold later in life.

Not everybody can be a CEO, director, doctor, lawyer, etc. There has to be a strong manufacturing base in a country and there needs to be jobs up and down the hierarchy. Manufacturing is part of that hierarchy.

And retaliation? Not likely. America is still the biggest market as far as consumers go. Not for long though if jobs keep getting offshored. The generation that is currently in college will find that out soon enough.

Some people just don't do the research and open their mouths about the need for an industrial base and not to give it to the enemy. Thanks for this statement.

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That is why you will never be the Emperor of the USA. BTW - how well did your philosophy work out for a USA supplier providing sapphire screens?????

If Apple had did their research they never would have gone with GT, Apple knew what the outcome would be and sent more than half the worlds saphire production to china. I'm certain that china was in on this!
 
Not really ...

I just read that oil companies make 5 cents a gallon of gas in profits. The US government takes about 70 cents a gallon (in California. Varies by location depending on local taxes). So two questions : between those two... Who is taking an excessive amount? And do you think 5 cents a gallon is excessive? Do you think that the percentage of profit is more or less than the majority of businesses? People that make such "excessive profit" claims have never even compared profit margins as compared to other industries.

Not entirely true:

http://www.factcheck.org/2011/05/playing-politics-with-gasoline-prices/
 
Take into consideration all the "educated" people (robotics engineers, programmers, managers, etc.) that are involved in developing these robots, and they're paid far more than a 1000 assembly line workers combined. There is a surplus of humans in India and China.

Wages are far higher in the West, and along with the strict labor laws, robots work out to be more cost-effective here, but that's definitely not the case in the East.

Except Foxconn and other chinese companies provide accommodation and often meals for employees, as well as training and protective clothing.

Robots don't need any of these things, so it is cost effective to use robots.
 

Not sure why you are sending me an article talking about what affect proposed legislation would have on future prices of gas.... i made no comment on that at all. What i said was that the government takes a lot of taxes from our pockets from every gallon of gas. This is not hypothetical, this is not a guess. It is as transparent and clear as could be. See this link, that has a map showing the amount of taxes that are in every gallon of gas, by state. I'm in California, which happens to be the highest (70cents a gallon). Again, this is not some hypothetical future change to gas prices, as your article is talking about. It is what they are currently collecting from gas purchases.

http://www.exxonmobilperspectives.com/2014/02/07/this-gasoline-tax-map-explains-a-lot/

I mentioned this amount of tax collected as a comparison to someone's remark that Oil companies make excessive profits. It's sad that so many people pay so much attention and give so much scrutiny to what a company makes... yet completely ignore how much the government takes from our pockets. Wake up people!

Least profitable businesses in the US:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/sageworks/2014/08/31/the-least-profitable-businesses-in-the-u-s/
See anything in particular in this list?

Here is my favorite article, because it references Apple (and the fact that they make like around 3 Times the profit of oil companies...

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2012/10/20/big-oil-isnt-as-profitable-as-everyone-thinks/

Interesting stuff... I'm not trying to defend any particular company or industry.... just if anyone wants to criticize the oil industry, they should know that most companies earn a higher profit margin than they do.

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So what you are saying, is that Exxon could give the oil away for free and still make bank? Or they could make a penny per gallon and still make billions?

Wow.

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Great Comment. I love these people who make these comments... right up until the "oh, crap, this will affect my life" realization hits them. Obviously no Idea how the world works and probably never even left the country to see how it does work.

Indeed. I remember when i took all the business classes them talking briefly (not in too much depth, as it was not an area i was going to specialize in) about tariffs and import taxes and all that. It's a highly complicated area. There is so much to it, that the average person would just never think about or understand.
 
Origin of Political order

I highly recommend the book Origins of Political Order. Reading that book will give you a very clear and interesting view of China's history. It will also let you know that we need that robot to fail and keep failing. If it succeeds, China is going to have to do something with those 1+ Billion people and if their history is any indication, we're not going to like the outcome. :( :)
 
Foxconn started with Fanuc robots from Japan which were perfect! I guess they tried to do their own robots and failed miserably!

Foxconn, stick to Fanuc!
I thought they where going with ABB's Frida Human robot - ordered a million of it. I guess the decided to go with their own in-house brand. Does not look very innovative at all.
 
Americans were sold down the river years ago by our government. We cant compete with slave labor, manufacturing will never return and it has nothing to do with union labor either, that's just common rhetoric used by people who like to enjoy the fruits of slave labor. China buys our debt and its just to keep us consuming their products..
 
But can it take a picture of itself using the iPhone to make its way into retail box?

FYI for members who haven't been here long enough and didn't get this inside joke: Someone found a selfie of an assembly line girl in his brand new iPhone.

I wonder what the robots fingernails will look like
 
Makes me wonder what's happening with Google and Foxconn.

Earlier this year, the WSJ had an article about how Google... who has bought up a lot of robot companies... was working with Foxconn to create manufacturing robots.

In the kind of ironic twist that permeates the electronics business, iPhones could end up being made by robots designed by Google under the leadership of Andy Rubin (former head of Android).
 
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