Mechatronics (Part-VIII)- Advantages, Disadvantages And Societal Impact Of Automation

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Find Out The Advantages, Disadvantages and Societal Impact Of Automation

Here we continue with the eighth part of our blog on mechatronics. Those who have missed our seventh blog can read it from Here. It will help to connect with the eighth part of the blog discussing about the advantages, disadvantages and societal impact of automation. Let us explore the blog to find out in more details. In words of Tom Peters:

“For a blue-collar worker, the driving force behind change was factory automation using programmable machine tools. For an office worker, it’s office automation using computer technology: enterprise-resource-planning systems, groupware, intranets, extranets, expert systems, the Web and E-Commerce.”

Advantages and Disadvantages of Automation

Perhaps the most cited advantage of automation in industry is that it is associated with faster production and cheaper labor costs. Another benefit could be that it replaces hard, physical, or monotonous work. Additionally, tasks that take place in hazardous environments or that are otherwise beyond human capabilities can be done by machines, as machines can operate even under extreme temperatures or in atmospheres that are radioactive or toxic. They can also be maintained with simple quality checks. However, at the time being, not all tasks can be automated, and some tasks are more expensive to automate than others. Initial costs of installing the machinery in factory settings are high, and failure to maintain a system could result in the loss of the product itself. Moreover, some studies seem to indicate that industrial automation could impose ill effects beyond operational concerns, including worker displacement due to systemic loss of employment and compounded environmental damage; however, these findings are both convoluted and controversial in nature, and could potentially be circumvented. The main advantages of automation are-

• Increased throughput or productivity.
• Improved quality or increased predictability of quality.
• Improved robustness (consistency), of processes or product.
• Increased consistency of output.
• Reduced direct human labor costs and expenses.
• Installation in operations reduces cycle time.
• Can complete tasks where a high degree of accuracy is required.
• Replaces human operators in tasks that involve hard physical or monotonous work (e.g., using one forklift with a single driver instead of a team of multiple workers to lift a heavy object)
• Reduces some occupational injuries (e.g., fewer strained backs from lifting heavy objects)
• Replaces humans in tasks done in dangerous environments (i.e. fire, space, volcanoes, nuclear facilities, underwater, etc.)
• Performs tasks that are beyond human capabilities of size, weight, speed, endurance, etc.
• Reduces operation time and work handling time significantly.
• Frees up workers to take on other roles.
• Provides higher level jobs in the development, deployment, maintenance and running of the automated processes.

The main disadvantages of automation are:

• Possible security threats/vulnerability due to increased relative susceptibility for committing errors.
• Unpredictable or excessive development costs.
• High initial cost.
• Displaces workers due to job replacement.
• Leads to further environmental damage and could compound climate change

Societal Impact of Automation

Increased automation can often cause workers to feel anxious about losing their jobs as technology renders their skills or experience unnecessary. Early in the Industrial Revolution, when inventions like the steam engine were making some job categories expendable, workers forcefully resisted these changes. Luddites, for instance, were English textile workers who protested the introduction of weaving machines by destroying them. Similar movements have sprung up periodically ever since. For most of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the most influential of these movements were led by organized labor, which advocated for the retraining of workers whose jobs were rendered redundant by machines. Currently, the relative anxiety about automation reflected in opinion polls seems to correlate closely with the strength of organized labor in that region or nation. For example, while a recent study by the Pew Research Center indicated that 72% of Americans are worried about increasing automation in the workplace, 80% of Swedes see automation and artificial intelligence as a good thing, due to the country’s still-powerful unions and a more robust national safety net. Automation is already contributing significantly to unemployment, particularly in nations where the government does not proactively seek to diminish its impact. In the United States, 47% of all current jobs have the potential to be fully automated by 2033, according to the research of experts Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne. Furthermore, wages and educational attainment appear to be strongly negatively correlated with an occupation’s risk of being automated. Prospects are particularly bleak for occupations that do not presently require a university degree, such as truck driving. Even in high-tech corridors like Silicon Valley, concern is spreading about a future in which a sizable percentage of adults have little chance of sustaining gainful employment. As the example of Sweden suggests, however, the transition to a more automated future need not inspire panic, if there is sufficient political will to promote the retraining of workers whose positions are being rendered obsolete.

Continued in the next blog...