When I read a story like this, I'm not faulting a Uniqlo for choosing progress. It's logical and extremely profitable. I think the alarm is precisely because of how much sense it makes.

Enough incremental progress has been made for us to arrive at this threshold, after which a company like Uniqlo can lay off 90% of their workforce by investing an amount which is, if I'm not mistaken[0], considerably less than what they profit in one year.

That's not incremental. It's unprecedented.

[0] https://www.fastretailing.com/eng/ir/financial/summary.html

Absolutely, if I were in a position where my job were easily automated I would be terrified.

I suspect the majority of HN readers are in a less precarious position, so we have the privilege of a little detachment in our horror at the prospect of huge swathes of automation.

What to do though? There is very little we can do to stymie the inevitable unemplocalyspe without ripping up society's rulebook altogether.

I fear unionization may have been the answer 30+ years ago but that particular horse has well and truly bolted. Universal basic income failed in Finland as far as I can remember (I could be wrong on all counts there, it's still early!), and let's be honest - any government legislation would just lead to a global race-to-the-bottom as nations prostitute their labour laws to attract companies priced out of traditional locations by taxation and fines. Trade tariffs would only drive companies to diversify into new markets and if consumer demand was there, a thriving grey market would emerge...

Perhaps 'hand packed' will just join 'organic' 'sustainable' and 'free range' as desirable things to have on your packaging? Check out these hand-picked shoes!

Uniqlo are an interesting example, they compete primarily on price anyway (Heck, I'm wearing a pair of their cheapo selvage jeans) so they will absolutely push this as far as they can.

Well worth keeping an eye on them over the next couple of years to see how it plays out - will likely form the template.

It's one of those things where it doesn't make much sense when you look at it case-by-case, but the aggregate of them becomes a real problem, and somebody has to pay for it. Ideally, since it's a common problem, everybody does - i.e. we tax productivity more, and use that money to support people whose wages are driven down or whose jobs are lost.

Companies as a group should be aware that they are just a polite fiction that exists only because actual people allow them to exist. If they continue down the path of externalizing all costs while internalizing all revenues, people may one day decide that they're tired of humouring the fiction. If we somehow got to a point where 90% of workers were laid off due to automation, with no adjustments to the social safety net, then I think we would be long past that point already. In that sense, Uniqlo is effectively freeloading off the fact that other companies haven't similarly automated, because if they had, Uniqlo would not be able to exist. Nobody would be able to afford its clothing, and there would be massive societal unrest to the point that people would probably not even respect the "right" of a company to do things like hold private property.

> If you found a cheaper supplier of milk, would you feel obligated to reimburse your milk man?

According to the TWU, yes - the MTA is required to pay the TWU $450,000 whenever it uses a machine to bore tunnels, because forty years ago, that job would have been performed by a human instead.

Well that's just dumb. Taxpayers are subsidizing TWU -- actually paying for absolutely nothing in return.

> Well that's just dumb. Taxpayers are subsidizing TWU -- actually paying for absolutely nothing in return.

I agree that it is a terrible idea. Unfortunately, NY government (and the elections) are so corrupt that there's literally nothing we can do about it.