robots replace workers one
Robot Workers, I
Vocabulary
| grip | demand (2) | side-by-side |
| cost (2) | potential | operation (2) |
| intend | automation | productivity |
| destroy | counterpart | generation (2) |
| end up | assistance | cooperation |
| replace | remain (3) | one way or another |
Video
Transcript
The Schunk Company produces robot grippers.
Demand for automation is enormous. But so are the potential costs: a new study by ING Bank says automation will cost Germany up to 18 million jobs over the next twenty years, replacing one out of every two workers with robots.
Carsten Brzeski, ING-DiBa Chief Economist: “It’s becoming clear that this industrial revolution is quite unlike the old one.
I’m afraid that in the end, it’s going to destroy jobs than it creates.”
Germany is already a global leader when it comes to the number of industrial robots in operation. Only South Korea and Japan have more automated production than Germany.
The Schunk Company is already working on the next generation of industrial robots. The machines are meant to increase productivity, of course, but they are not intended to replace people.
Intelligent robots are intended to work independently, side-by-side with their human counterparts.
Henrik A. Schunk, Schunk CEO: “Thanks to the cooperation between humans and machines, jobs that normally leave Germany will stay in the country.
And that’s a good thing — robotic assistance will end up saving jobs.”
One way or another, automation is here to stay, whether it will cost jobs or create them remains to be seen.
Questions
1. The Schunk Company has many clients and prospects. True or false?
2. According to ING Bank, will robots replace about twenty percent of German workers?
3. Germany utilizes automation more than any other country in the world. Yes or no?
4. What is the purpose of automation, according to the Schunk CEO?
5. Do the bank economist and robot manufacturing CEO agree about the impact of robots and automation?
6. Is the tone of this report optimistic, pessimistic, neutral, both, neither or it depends?
A. There are robots and automation in your company or industry. Is this right or wrong? What do they do?
B. What tasks in your company or industry could be automated?
C. What may happen in the future?
D. How do your friends and colleagues feel about robots, computers and automation? What do they think about them?
D. What should happen to the workers displaced or made redundant by robots and automation?
