Steve Jobs and a world gone mad

andvari said:
The real question is where is society headed when you only need 15% or so of the population to supply all it's material needs. What is the other 85% going to do?

Yes, that is the question.

A study published in the Economist not long ago concluded that the U.S. has lost far more jobs in the last decade to automation than those sent overseas. And while I'm always somewhat skeptical of "studies", this one is not hard to believe. If we just look at how many times each day we interact with some kind of machine that use to be a person. And as automation continues to become more sophistcated this will become more and more the norm.

And yet, jobs going overseas still seems to be what worries Americans most.  ???
 
harry_ said:
So if all those things are the same across all Chinese plants it makes Foxxcon ok?
No. But as i said things are not the same in all Chinese plants and at Foxconn the higher pay and lower suicide rate makes them better than others in China.
 
If Foxconn's not bad I'd hate to hear about the really bad ones.  The "workers" only recently got a bump in pay after their recent group of suicides.  At that time factory workers of other companies were walking out or protesting their low pay.  NY Times:"The Honda strike, which lasted more than two weeks, was a rare show of power by Chinese workers, who are not commonly allowed by the government to publicly strike and walk off the job for higher wages."  What would have happened to them if the Chinese government enforced the part where "they are not allowed"?

Article in the URL is dated June 2, 2010 and there were already 10 suicides by then.  Stats on Wikipedia (grain of salt) stated that there were 18 attemps and 14 deaths.  In 2011 there were three attempts with two confirmed deaths.

NY Times on the Foxconn issue

From Wiki:
"An 83 page report detailing the Foxconn suicides and labor conditions was produced by 20 universities in Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China.  Interviews of 1,800 Foxconn workers at 12 factories found evidence of illegal overtime and failure to report accidents.  The report also criticized Foxconn's management style, which it called inhumane and abusive.

A Hong Kong-based non-profit organization, Students & Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour, also produced a report on Foxconn employee mistreatment."

And despite all of this Apple still makes their product from this plant as if it doesn't happen at all.  There is no oversight in these places, little gets reported and if given the chance they'd to that to US employees too if there weren't so many regulations, but there is definitely a case for too many regulations that makes companies jump the pond to save money.
 
Interesting discussion. Lots of info, etc.

Lets be careful this does not turn argumentitive,  or personal in nature.    In which case the discussion ends.

Also  if you take the political test linked to in a previous post , I do not think  your results need to be posted. So that we having folks squaring off against each other.

Seth

SRSemenza FOG moderator
 
Five years from now and Apple will be as insignificant as it was prior to moving from computers to MP3 players....or whatever it is THEY call them. In other words it won't continue to be a driver of obsession for those who place bling over function. And its share price will be back at a sensible level. These things always happen!
 
I just read this article in the Telegraph online. Basically the guy behind all Apple's greatest inventions has just been knighted. It leaves me feeling very proud as he is a Brit!! It's so typical that we neither market nor make the outcome of British genius.

Want some funk?? Ask a Brit!!

Here's a snippet:

The 44-year-old was born in Chingford, north London, and studied design at the University of Northumbria. He joined Apple in 1992 and has been based in California ever since. Steve Jobs, who returned to Apple in 1996, appointed Ive to his current position in 1997. Ive made his reputation with a string of successful product designs, starting with the candy-coloured, translucent iMacs. As the company's fortunes began to improve, Ive led his design team in creating the iPod, iPhone, iPad, MacBook Air and many more distinctive products.

According to Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs, the company's late chief executive gave Ive a unique position within the company. Jobs told Isaacson: "He's not just a designer. That's why he works directly for me. He has more operational power than anyone else at Apple except me. There's no one who can tell him what to do, or to butt out. That's the way I set it up."


Someone was discussing what might happen when 15% of the workforce make everything we need. This is not a new situation by any means and is covered very well in Guns, Germs and Steel by Professor Jared Diamond. I would highly recommend the book as it has to rate as one of my best reads of 2011.

Wiki Page

Buy it on Amazon

 
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