[floxy]

I hesitated to use the word "construction" on purpose, because invariably someone on HN chimes in how back breaking manual labor is and how it wears out your body prematurely, etc.. :)

>I don't think any amount of money could ever get me to do concrete work

How complex is that work? Might it be a good candidate for machines/robots?

[silverquiet]

I'd think if it was amenable to mechanization, that would have happened in the last century or so. I distinctly remember Mike Rowe doing the job on his show "Dirty Jobs" so that might be worth looking up if you want a good picture of it.

There's plenty of machines involved to transport concrete via trucks and pumps and all that, but it always seems to end up with some grunt holding the nozzle and then lots of labor to ensure there are no voids and the surface is smooth.

I don't really know that much about robots, but the thing about houses is that nothing is really terribly exact - lots of stuff is just off by half an inch or something like that, so a lot of the work just ends up being somewhat custom. It doesn't seem like the kind of thing robots would handle well.

Maybe there's more room for it in prefab type construction? But of course there's a mobile home stigma there.