• Fresh 24-hour Tube strike announced for 5 August
    60 replies, posted
Wow what lazy fucks. I said it in the last thread and I'll say it again, I work 12 hours a day on £6.50 an hour, my job involves none stop lifting of loads up to 25kg constantly for 12 hours, I have around a 20 minute break, do you see me complaining? This is what the average factory/warehouse worker has to do every day yet you don't see warehouses/factories shutting down every five minutes due to strikes, these lazy tube workers needed to be fired and people who actually want the job need to be hired instead.
I would feel bad if it was a min wage job, but if they are making equal or more than double the livable wage, they need to fuck off.
crazy shit man, people angry about unions when unions would help them get better work conditions and pay. shit on people having it better than you instead of standing up for yourself, sure way of making the world a better place
[QUOTE=smidge146;48203958]Running automated systems requires a lot of people as well things have to maintained and such. there' no point in halting progression. If you were a businessman and saw an opportunity to make a load more profit after investing in automation you would do it.[/QUOTE] A prime example of why the world is fucked. Not everything should be about fucking profit or money it's disgusting
[QUOTE=Mechanical43;48204286]crazy shit man, people angry about unions when unions would help them get better work conditions and pay. shit on people having it better than you instead of standing up for yourself, sure way of making the world a better place[/QUOTE] Unions in and of themselves are not a problem, it is when a major form of public transportation is shut down because the workers decided they want more money is when a Union is an issue.
[QUOTE=duckmaster;48204605]Unions in and of themselves are not a problem, it is when a major form of public transportation is shut down because the workers decided they want more money is when a Union is an issue.[/QUOTE] From the looks of the posts in this thread, it sounds like the actual problem is the entitlement that people are expressing when hearing about others fighting for better wages.
[QUOTE=fragger0;48204385]A prime example of why the world is fucked. Not everything should be about fucking profit or money it's disgusting[/QUOTE] And people being paid shit all, working soul crushing jobs, just because you don't want a machine doing it is better? The end goal of automation is to keep as many out of work as possible so we can optimise our usgae of time and materials. Post scarcity isn't possible with people doing the labour as its horribly inefficient.
[QUOTE=DeeCeeTeeBee;48202906]My mother works with mentally/physically disadvantages people and has spent years getting the qualifications necessary to further her position and get involved in good private care homes. She has been doing this for over ten years now, and every few years improved her sitting and pay. She frequently works 12 hour shifts, and usually gets a day a week (not always) and her shortest shifts are 7-8 hours. Every day she is working with/helping people that could (and have) become violent at a moments notice, have aggressive tantrums, suffer from random bouts of pain or emotional distress and it's her job to help them through it all, as well as making sure (if they are unable to) that they are clean, fed, their homes safe and deal with any errands they may need to do (shopping, pet related stuff etc). Usually she works alone, with other specialists working with other She nets over 5k less per year compared to the average tub staff person (not the drivers). If she were working in a government funded area, she'd likely earn less. Striking for 25-30k a year, no qualifications, 35 hour weeks is something that she can't comprehend, and neither can I.[/QUOTE] The 2% pay rise they are being offered and decided to strike over is more than what healthcare professionals were striking over last year - nurses, midwives, physios, radiographers and such were all asking and striking for just a 1% rise, as was recommended by the official bodies to bring their pay more into line with inflation. That is while the pay for station staff is about £30k, just over £8k more than what a band 5 nurse or allied health professional starts off earning (£21k), not counting the London supplement, for a job that doesn't even require a uni degree. Even if the healthcare professional raises up to band 7, which requires a lot of training and years of effort, that tops out at £41k. A tube driver earns way more. I am all for fair pay and believe many jobs need increases, but the basic station job itself is incredibly well compensated for a job that doesn't require a degree, even accounting for strange hours, especially considering the price of travel. If nurses, carers and such strike over their pay, that would be acceptable and I would fully support it, same for teaching assistants, store assistants and such, all of whom are underpaid for what they do. These strikes just appear to be milking it though, at least to me. The basic station salary is above the average pay for the UK for a job that does not require a degree to enter.
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;48202571]"Jack fucking shit" Do you have any idea of the complex internal workings of a railway? No? Thought not.[/QUOTE] Nope but neither do they.
[QUOTE=hexpunK;48204721]And people being paid shit all, working soul crushing jobs, just because you don't want a machine doing it is better?[/QUOTE] I wouldn't say 50k a year is 'shit all' whatsoever
Nothing is ever good enough for the TfL union. They have too much power and need to be taken down a notch.
[QUOTE=fragger0;48211699]I wouldn't say 50k a year is 'shit all' whatsoever[/QUOTE] "Tube driver" isn't exactly representative of most of the jobs that would benefit from automation either.
[QUOTE=fragger0;48211699]I wouldn't say 50k a year is 'shit all' whatsoever[/QUOTE] Waste management, farming, shipping, generic janitorial work, warehouse/ dock workers, and many more positions. They get payed far less for how difficult the work is. Automation in farming is one of the biggest things to help society ever. [vid]http://i.imgur.com/rh3GHGP.webm[/vid]
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;48202300]Robots just purely cannot perform jobs like this where safety is absolutely imperative, it plainly and simply REQUIRES a human.[/QUOTE] Robots dont need to be perfectly safe, just better than the people. They already win in that regard, they're safer than drivers. [QUOTE=fragger0;48204385]A prime example of why the world is fucked. Not everything should be about fucking profit or money it's disgusting[/QUOTE] this isn't just about profit, it's about driving the entire human race forward. Or, if you really want we could just all go back to manually tilling farmland and hunter gathering to make sure everyone has a job. Your position boils down to the idea that we should artifically maintain problems we've already solved with technology just to keep people employed. It's more efficient just to use the technology then give government handouts to keep people from starving to death, if thats what you want to prevent. (Such would be life in a futuristic quasi-socialist utopia.) related: [video=youtube;7Pq-S557XQU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU[/video]
[QUOTE=Mattk50;48219181]Robots dont need to be perfectly safe, just better than the people. They already win in that regard, they're safer than drivers. this isn't just about profit, it's about driving the entire human race forward. Or, if you really want we could just all go back to manually tilling farmland and hunter gathering to make sure everyone has a job. Your position boils down to the idea that we should artifically maintain problems we've already solved with technology just to keep people employed. It's more efficient just to use the technology then give government handouts to keep people from starving to death, if thats what you want to prevent. (Such would be life in a futuristic quasi-socialist utopia.) related: [video=youtube;7Pq-S557XQU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU[/video][/QUOTE] You don't seem to realize how often robots depend on humans to function, especially ones that have to do shitty dirty tasks like mig/spot welding, I deal with them on a daily basis and I have to sort out multiple welding wire jams, tip burn-backs, stuck arms and seemingly inexplicable power supply stoppages, I'm inside a robotic welding cell more times than I'm loading parts onto the fixtures for the robots to weld some days. These robots costs millions of dollars yet they have so many problems that they need 24/7 human techs hanging around to fix the issues that arise, I wouldn't exactly call robots perfect - at least when it comes to really shitty dirty jobs like welding, from my experience though I can make an educated guess that robotic trains and other cleaner robotic jobs would still need someone to maintain them a couple of times weekly.
People always say train drivers get paid too much, but you've got to consider how many people's lives they've got in their hands. Talking hundreds of people at any one time. I'd find that stressful, I'm glad it's not my job. They're well within their rights to strike I think some of it is snobbery as well. 50 grand with only 2 GCSEs? People say. But you know if you don't like it, why don't you fucking join them? Become a train driver
[QUOTE=Scot;48211740]Nothing is ever good enough for the TfL union. They have too much power and need to be taken down a notch.[/QUOTE] Yeah I do agree that they're out of control to an extent
[QUOTE=hexpunK;48204721]And people being paid shit all, working soul crushing jobs, just because you don't want a machine doing it is better? The end goal of automation is to keep as many out of work as possible so we can optimise our usgae of time and materials. Post scarcity isn't possible with people doing the labour as its horribly inefficient.[/QUOTE] Kicking as many people out of a job as possible isn't gonna work without the framework to support them. You could probably automate 90% of jobs in every fast food place and service work in the western world in the next 5-10 years easy business but holy shit you would [I]nuke[/I] employment levels and what are half these people gonna fall back on? Nevermind the fact that these are the kinds of jobs that people typically end up having to do in order to afford education to move onto better work in the first place
[QUOTE=Scot;48211740]Nothing is ever good enough for the TfL union. They have too much power and need to be taken down a notch.[/QUOTE] Let me paint you a picture. Overworked drivers and techs, low pay and no benefits. That was the fucking SEPTA system in Philly for the longest time, it was only after they finally started performing mass strikes in the later half of the 20th century they were able to get any sort of fucking benefits. They still get paid severely less than Tube drives, shut the fuck off with this bullshit. They perform a function that is vital to you, instead of flipping out at the workers looking to be treated well, yell at the companies refusing to treat them well? When your workers go on strike, it's not random, its not happenstance, its because the contract negotiations failed.
[QUOTE=Shibbey;48231513]Kicking as many people out of a job as possible isn't gonna work without the framework to support them. You could probably automate 90% of jobs in every fast food place and service work in the western world in the next 5-10 years easy business[/QUOTE] Not really. There's a high capital cost involved with installing such equipment, programming robots and computers, plus a whole plethora of other factors involved. Even if every business made it their goal to automate waiters or services, it would take decades. Places like McDonalds aren't going to make their entire place automated, because the franchisee isn't going to want to spend a lot of money on expensive machinery. Even if they did the job better than people, they won't spend money on such machinery because of the prohibitive costs. It's not difficult to train somebody to fry food or clean a place. It's much harder to buy and install machinery to do that. Until the actual machinery used for automation becomes much cheaper, more reliable, etc you won't see this anytime soon. We could reach the 22nd century and these machines still probably wouldn't be in widespread use - self-service checkouts at supermarkets have faced major problems due to similar reasons (they can't sell alcohol for instance, and they are often faced by a plethora of bugs and breakdowns).
Imagine if we still had switchboard operators and an organized region of them went on strike. "Hello, operator? My Nvidia graphics card caught fire and my room is going up in flames, I need the fire dep... Hello? HELLO?"
Anyone here remember Bengley from the last thread? That's all I can think of when I see this thread.
[QUOTE=elevate;48234319]Anyone here remember Bengley from the last thread? That's all I can think of when I see this thread.[/QUOTE] Wasn't he OP and a tube worker promoting the strike at that point?
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;48232179]Not really. There's a high capital cost involved with installing such equipment, programming robots and computers, plus a whole plethora of other factors involved. Even if every business made it their goal to automate waiters or services, it would take decades. Places like McDonalds aren't going to make their entire place automated, because the franchisee isn't going to want to spend a lot of money on expensive machinery. Even if they did the job better than people, they won't spend money on such machinery because of the prohibitive costs. It's not difficult to train somebody to fry food or clean a place. It's much harder to buy and install machinery to do that. Until the actual machinery used for automation becomes much cheaper, more reliable, etc you won't see this anytime soon. We could reach the 22nd century and these machines still probably wouldn't be in widespread use - self-service checkouts at supermarkets have faced major problems due to similar reasons (they can't sell alcohol for instance, and they are often faced by a plethora of bugs and breakdowns).[/QUOTE] [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfKbaX4jE9U]Something like this is hardly high tech or really that expensive[/url], it's simply a touch screen. Hell, in quite a few countries [url=https://prosquared.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/img_1899.jpg]fast food places are already not much more than giant vending machines[/url] which are about as futuristic as banging rocks together these days If people really wanted to get these things working as more than a gimmick I doubt it'd be that hard, I seriously doubt it's more complex than driverless cars (which are coming super fucking soon, apparently), saying it's more than 80 years away tech is naive, think about the shit we didn't have in 1935 that we have now. I think the biggest obstacle to these sorts of things is that customers and general public might reject them
[QUOTE=Shibbey;48236777][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfKbaX4jE9U]Something like this is hardly high tech or really that expensive[/url], it's simply a touch screen. Hell, in quite a few countries [url=https://prosquared.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/img_1899.jpg]fast food places are already not much more than giant vending machines[/url] which are about as futuristic as banging rocks together these days If people really wanted to get these things working as more than a gimmick I doubt it'd be that hard, I seriously doubt it's more complex than driverless cars (which are coming super fucking soon, apparently), saying it's more than 80 years away tech is naive, think about the shit we didn't have in 1935 that we have now. I think the biggest obstacle to these sorts of things is that customers and general public might reject them[/QUOTE] Only problem is that the economics doesn't really work out. If it really was that easy, they would be becoming much more widespread in a shorter timeframe. I'm not saying the technology is 80 years away, it's already here today. I'm saying that nobody is going to be really using it simply because of the fact that it's usually cheaper to hire staff. It's for the same reason that self-service checkouts are not being adopted as quickly as once believed. One of the big advantages with staff is that if business picks up or slows down you can easily adapt your business to fit around it. If business suddenly picks up you will need to spend a lot of time and money on outfitting the restaurant to cope with the demand. If it takes longer than to simply hire a bunch of students then the machines are already facing another disadvantage. Your competitor will be stealing all of the business while you are installing machines. Another huge problem is that if you are a busy business and then suddenly face a major drop in sales, you are going to have a lot of these machines which represent major fixed costs (not to mention you will probably have to pay to maintain them, interest on loans used to buy them, etc). Unlike workers (which are a lot more flexible), you can't do much of the same with machinery. The types of tasks that get automated first are typically ones which have a really high volume, simple tasks. It's done where it's worthwhile, which is why a machine churning out hammers or bottled drinks is much better than a worker. In a place like McDonalds the workers can be easily transferred from one task to another (working tills, cookers, cleaning, etc). In addition, most of the stuff that needs done isn't as simple as you think it is. You have a large menu that may change at given notice, people ordering different combinations, etc. People won't like it if the robot cash register informs them they can't have a burger without the pickles (or inadvertently makes one with them), and they will want to complain to a human manager. A McDonalds by itself is an incredibly complex place, and it's one of the simplest restaurants there is. While computers are getting better at learning, it's a costly and time-intensive process that still isn't as flexible or as cheap as a human anytime soon. I think a lot of people are underestimating how long automation really takes. Despite the fact that mechanization on farms and in agriculture only began in the 19th century, it still took well over a hundred years for human labour to become negligible. Japan (which is seen as a place of technological sophistication) still had many farms operated by manual labour as late as the 1970s.
[QUOTE=Mattk50;48219181] this isn't just about profit, it's about driving the entire human race forward. Or, if you really want we could just all go back to manually tilling farmland and hunter gathering to make sure everyone has a job. Your position boils down to the idea that we should artifically maintain problems we've already solved with technology just to keep people employed. It's more efficient just to use the technology then give government handouts to keep people from starving to death, if thats what you want to prevent. (Such would be life in a futuristic quasi-socialist utopia.) [/QUOTE] Yeah the issue here being that our society would need to be altruistic as fuck in order to prevent these now laid off people from starving, being made homeless. Goodness knows there are too many people who are homeless/unemployed/starving etc... heck there is a not insignificant proportion of people who, despite having a home and a job, cannot keep up with the bills enough to be able to afford food on a regular basis and are in what's knows as food poverty. [URL="https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/GLA_Child%20Hunger%20in%20London_FINAL_1.pdf"]More information here.[/URL] You speak of driving the human race forwards, and whilst I agree, it should not be done so at detriment to the quality of human lives, machines should make everyone's life better and not exacerbate problems we already have. Automation for automations sake will not work unless society has already been prepared for the situation and we're just not there yet. [editline]18th July 2015[/editline] Also worth mentioning, as it stands, tubes will never be fully "staffless" you need people on board for security etc... I imagine that while the stop and go part of the train may one day be in the hands of a robot, a human would remain on board to oversee both the robot and keep an eye on the passengers.
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;48236886]Only problem is that the economics doesn't really work out. If it really was that easy, they would be becoming much more widespread in a shorter timeframe. I'm not saying the technology is 80 years away, it's already here today. I'm saying that nobody is going to be really using it simply because of the fact that it's usually cheaper to hire staff. It's for the same reason that self-service checkouts are not being adopted as quickly as once believed. One of the big advantages with staff is that if business picks up or slows down you can easily adapt your business to fit around it. If business suddenly picks up you will need to spend a lot of time and money on outfitting the restaurant to cope with the demand. If it takes longer than to simply hire a bunch of students then the machines are already facing another disadvantage. Your competitor will be stealing all of the business while you are installing machines. Another huge problem is that if you are a busy business and then suddenly face a major drop in sales, you are going to have a lot of these machines which represent major fixed costs (not to mention you will probably have to pay to maintain them, interest on loans used to buy them, etc). Unlike workers (which are a lot more flexible), you can't do much of the same with machinery. [B]The types of tasks that get automated first are typically ones which have a really high volume, simple tasks.[/B] It's done where it's worthwhile, which is why a machine churning out hammers or bottled drinks is much better than a worker. In a place like McDonalds the workers can be easily transferred from one task to another (working tills, cookers, cleaning, etc). In addition, most of the stuff that needs done isn't as simple as you think it is. You have a large menu that may change at given notice, people ordering different combinations, etc. People won't like it if the robot cash register informs them they can't have a burger without the pickles (or inadvertently makes one with them), and they will want to complain to a human manager. A McDonalds by itself is an incredibly complex place, and it's one of the simplest restaurants there is. While computers are getting better at learning, it's a costly and time-intensive process that still isn't as flexible or as cheap as a human anytime soon. I think a lot of people are underestimating how long automation really takes. Despite the fact that mechanization on farms and in agriculture only began in the 19th century, it still took well over a hundred years for human labour to become negligible. Japan (which is seen as a place of technological sophistication) still had many farms operated by manual labour as late as the 1970s.[/QUOTE] You only need to design the system once to replace every single McDonalds in America. If that isn't high volume then I dunno what to tell you.
[QUOTE=Kybalt;48237160]You only need to design the system [b]once[/b] to replace every single McDonalds in America. If that isn't high volume then I dunno what to tell you.[/QUOTE] And you're absolutely sure of this?
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;48237185]And you're absolutely sure of this?[/QUOTE] Yes. All of those things you mentioned about different customer choices for orders? They already exist on the cashier's side in most places so that the line cook knows what not to put on the burger. I do keto, and order my burgers without buns. It comes up on my receipt as a burger without buns. Given that that is an option, I think pickles can certainly be avoided pretty easily. Plus, the point isn't to 100% automate every McDonalds today. But if you can automate the order taking and fulfilling, you only need one regional office of slightly more trained staff to go around and service 10s of different locations, maybe with 1 "manager" at each location who keeps it running and cleans up spills. Then at non-busy times the regional office schedules all of the other maintence and cleaning. You'd still end up saving a ton of money, especially since the technology will only get better, and the cost to employ someone will only increase.
[QUOTE=Kybalt;48237287]Yes. All of those things you mentioned about different customer choices for orders? They already exist on the cashier's side in most places so that the line cook knows what not to put on the burger. I do keto, and order my burgers without buns. It comes up on my receipt as a burger without buns. Given that that is an option, I think pickles can certainly be avoided pretty easily. Plus, the point isn't to 100% automate every McDonalds today. But if you can automate the order taking and fulfilling, you only need one regional office of slightly more trained staff to go around and service 10s of different locations, maybe with 1 "manager" at each location who keeps it running and cleans up spills. Then at non-busy times the regional office schedules all of the other maintence and cleaning. You'd still end up saving a ton of money, especially since the technology will only get better, and the cost to employ someone will only increase.[/QUOTE] The point I was making is that are considerable difficulties with automation which will delay the scenario you describe until at least midcentury. For now, it's easier and cheaper to hire humans. Not every McDonalds is the same, you have different buildings with all sorts of suppliers from around the country. If and when it is adopted, it will be piecemeal in various McDonalds around the country and it will be staggered and probably meet constant setbacks too. Until it's proven to be both more reliable and more cost-effective to use than humans, adoption will be extremely limited and will be more for novelty or experimental purposes.
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