1. Japan has an ageing population [1] which means a declining working population. That means job losses don't convert into increased unemployment.
2. Some say Japan relatively prefers robots to immigrants [2] due to "traditional xenophobia".
3. Some people think [3,4] it's due to indigenous religions; that the Christian tradition says only God can create life and any human with the hubris to play god will inevitably be punished, possibly at the hands of their own creation; whereas Shinto says there are hidden spirits in things like trees, rocks, rivers, mountains and so on.
4. Or maybe it's just because their media is full of heroic friendly robots and cyborgs.
Of course, the business value of strapping a robot arm to a bean-to-cup coffee vending machine is another matter...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aging_of_Japan [2] https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/01/japan-prefers-robot-bea... [3] https://www.technologyreview.com/s/421187/why-japanese-love-... [4] https://www.wired.com/story/ideas-joi-ito-robot-overlords/
My explanation is probably not completely accurate (non-native english speaker so it's hard for me to get to the point), but it's important to understand the difference in culture.
so any retail or food service job replaced by a robot means one fewer job for someone who might need it. in a just world that would be great, the whole point of doing work should be so that we have to do less work, but that's not how society is structured now. an american barista who loses their job to a robot has more or less no safety net at this point. the only benefit in this story is more profit for whoever no longer has to pay a human when they can pay a robot less for the same job
I can't speak for "the west", but in the US, very important things are tied to employment like health insurance & retirement benefits and others. So, if a robot takes your job, then you (or even your kids) are on average likely to be one medical emergency away from bankruptcy.
- want to have a job
- don't want to pay to retrain
- don't want to become unemployed (and then have to compete for another job)
It is not a gimmick, from the POV of a business looking to cut labour costs, as alluded to in the article. However, it is disingenuous on their part to suggest that they are forced towards automation due to government policies or worker apathy. The real reasons might be that a robot (arm) is not subject to any employment rights, does not need breaks, goes off sick, refuses to work extra hours, requires various other perks like holidays, paternity/maternity leave, no promotion - unless it is a firmware upgrade etc.
Uber would bite that arm off, if they could remove the 'labour' element tomorrow, as they frequently clash with unions and governments around the world. Nonetheless, they are already moving towards the goal of autonomous vehicles.
I can only speculate, Japan has had a traditional job-for-life ethos, removing any anxiety. It also has a different set of socio-economic issues to deal with. One of them would be an ageing population, low influx of immigrant workers - which might cement the robot culture even more.
but Japan's automation efforts started half a century ago: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0166497294...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_r...
but it really pains me to only see headlines like "automation is killing jobs" from the west. meanwhile in japan they have a long tradition of replacing jobs with robots. their society is very happy about it, which lead to massive industries focusing mainly/only on automation.
so my multi-part question is: why is the west scared of automation? does it have to do with a lack of knowledge, or is it because of a different attitude towards jobs than in japan? why does it seem like western societies care more about truck drivers and baristas than providing better jobs?