What changed
Amazon now has more than 1 million robots operating around the clock in its warehouses, and it plans to expand that fleet by building factories for increasingly capable machines.
The company still employs more than 1.5 million full- and part-time workers. Amazon says robots are taking on the most physically demanding fulfillment tasks, after the company acquired Kiva Systems in 2012 and renamed it Amazon Robotics.
Why it matters
This is not a story about humans disappearing from Amazon’s warehouses. It is a story about who sets the speed of work.
Amazon’s robots move inventory pods and handle demanding tasks, while people still manage work the machines cannot. That could reduce some lifting and walking. It could also put employees physically closer to machines that help dictate the pace, creating a different kind of pressure.
The stakes are high because warehouse work is already unusually hard on the body. Injury and illness rates in the US warehouse sector have typically been more than twice the average across all industries. Amazon’s 200 million Prime subscribers help explain why the company keeps pushing for faster fulfillment, but speed is not automatically the same thing as safer work.
The important unanswered question is not simply how many jobs robots will replace. The report does not establish how many jobs automation will eliminate or create. The sharper question is whether Amazon’s expanding robotic system gives human workers more control over difficult work, or makes them responsible for keeping up with machines that never slow down.
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