[NorthGuy1]

Have you seen the improvements to garbage collection? A giant mechanical arm grabs a specially designed trash bin and tips it into the open top. The garbage man doesn't even need to get close to the bin. Hell, he barely has to get out of the heated truck (in northern Canada). The abundance of cheap labour just delays the implementation of "leisure-efficient" technology.

Here's a video of the truck in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GprMe6A5DR8

[mkr-hn]

The local trash company (Winder, Georgia) switched to these recently. As much as I like new tech, I wonder about the two guys who used to run off to each side of the road to grab cans. Did they find new jobs?

[ctdonath]

So much for minimum wage. Cost of automation was cheaper than hiring two guys to do the same. Ask 'em if they'd have taken a pay cut to not have their jobs cut.

[mkr-hn]

On the plus side, Barrow County is getting a lot of new stuff. They might have gone off to Bogart to get a job at the new Caterpillar plant, or to the retail development on University Parkway.

It's still not great to be replaced by a robot, but it's not a hopeless situation here like it is in a lot of places.