Ford style assembly lines made the work of the factory workers more miserable. Partially automated cashier did the same thing.
I don't think there is any point in trying to resist automation, as the efficiency benefits are too important.
In those cases, that led to a transition period, nowadays only a small fraction of the human population is working to produce food, and their job is more about planning, finance and orchestration of machine work, but many specialised jobs were lost or made miserable in the process.
IMHO any job that can be done by a machine should not be done by a human, the tricky part is going there with as little undesirable effects as possible.
The ones with 10 hour shifts and mandatory overtime? Yea, I don't think it's the _line_ that's making them miserable.
> Partially automated cashier did the same thing.
I've not once heard anyone in the service industry make this complaint.
> as the efficiency benefits are too important.
You can squeeze every last drop of productivity from your employees. In the short term this may even evidence profits. In the long term it only works if you hold a monopoly position.
The whole innovation was about making the jobs as simple and repetitive as possible so humans would basically work like robots.
Once you're there, having removed any agency and freedom, pushing the hours to the limits of human exhaustion is just one logical step.
Yes it was jarring for me to experience that.
So they make fewer mistakes. Not that they become zombies that you are then able to abuse.
> pushing the hours to the limits of human exhaustion is just one logical step.
There's nothing logical about ignoring consequences. Which is probably why the "union strike" even exists. It's fighting illogic with illogic.
I would have been happy writting z80 and 68000 assembly code for an entire career.
If we look at automation beyond assemblers (e.g. compilers), even if you or I might be content without it, I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of programmers are glad they don't have to write assembly.
