Amazon Plans To Avoid Hiring 600,000 Workers Through Automation by 2033, Leaked Documents Show 73
Amazon executives believe the company can avoid hiring more than 160,000 workers in the United States by 2027 through robotic automation. Internal documents viewed by The New York Times show the automation would save approximately 30 cents on each item the company picks, packs and delivers. The documents reveal that executives told Amazon's board last year they hoped automation would allow the company to flatten its U.S. workforce growth over the next decade.
Amazon expects to sell twice as many products by 2033. That projection translates to more than 600,000 positions Amazon would not need to fill. Amazon opened its most advanced warehouse in Shreveport, Louisiana last year as a template for future facilities. The site uses a thousand robots and employed a quarter fewer workers than it would have without automation. The company plans to replicate this design in approximately 40 facilities by the end of 2027. A facility in Stone Mountain, Georgia currently employs roughly 4,000 workers. After a planned robotic retrofit, internal analyses project it will process 10% more items but need as many as 1,200 fewer employees. The documents show Amazon's robotics team has set a goal to automate 75% of its operations.
Amazon expects to sell twice as many products by 2033. That projection translates to more than 600,000 positions Amazon would not need to fill. Amazon opened its most advanced warehouse in Shreveport, Louisiana last year as a template for future facilities. The site uses a thousand robots and employed a quarter fewer workers than it would have without automation. The company plans to replicate this design in approximately 40 facilities by the end of 2027. A facility in Stone Mountain, Georgia currently employs roughly 4,000 workers. After a planned robotic retrofit, internal analyses project it will process 10% more items but need as many as 1,200 fewer employees. The documents show Amazon's robotics team has set a goal to automate 75% of its operations.
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I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
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Those whiners are someone else's customers.
I Love You (Score:2)
Well in the future Idiocracy, you can always be a Costco greeter.
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I'd much rather be a Costco greeter than a warehouse picker. I mean, that isn't even a close call.
I worked in a warehouse for a couple of days as part of a study I was doing. In those days, I was racking up 15 miles/day. Much harder on the body than being a greeter.
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I worked in two different warehousing jobs when I was younger, they both sucked, the pay sucked, and both were fairly dangerous. When I worked at Amazon (physical security, not logistics) some of the people that I regularly worked with had started in the FCs (Fulfillment Centers) as contractors and moved to full time employees. What they described as their jobs there was absolutely nothing like what I had done. Sure, it was boring, repetitious work, but the pay scale was much higher, there were full bene
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They don't do it to be nice
Duh.
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An efficient economy can support more people through welfare or universal basic income...
It's also efficient to stuff 6 people into a 900 sq ft apartment. Neither that nor UBI will lead to anything good.
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It's what happens when you're thinking is completely constrained by your upbringing.
I don't actually know for sure what the solution is but Ubi is useless by itself. Monopolies form and even if you manage to get Ubi passed into law they just soak up all the money using high prices from Monopoly power.
Meanwhile the billionaires have noticed they are dependent on a cap
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UBI is the libertarian answer to everything. It lets them imagine they can let everything collapse but somehow capitalism survives. It's what happens when you're thinking is completely constrained by your upbringing. I don't actually know for sure what the solution is but Ubi is useless by itself. Monopolies form and even if you manage to get Ubi passed into law they just soak up all the money using high prices from Monopoly power. Meanwhile the billionaires have noticed they are dependent on a capitalist system and have decided they don't like that. They shouldn't have to drive their power and prestige from us filthy consumers. The idea that capitalism might be killed by the capitalists never really occurred to anyone. I mean outside of a few academics I think and some sci-fi authors.
UBI is the only answer most people can even begin to wrap their heads around, having grown up in a world where capitalism is the driver of nearly every aspect of their lives. In truth, we're past the point where scarcity is a real problem, but we continue to act as if it is a problem because that allows the capitalistic system to continue to churn. Fuck you, pay me, is the way our world operates.
I think any real, long-term solution, would have to consider options outside the capitalist ideal. Note: That doe
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Can we just stop with this post scarcity nonsense.
We are not in some post scarcity utopia. We are rapidly running out of real-estate. Yes we can build up but many was not meant to live in endless concrete jungle, most people don't really want to, but the consequence of unbound population growth (which does seem to be slowing, for reasons of scarcity) would be ecological collapse as we take to much away from the remaining natural spaces.
The cost of energy is also going up. Wind and Solar don't actually low
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Can we just stop with this post scarcity nonsense.
We are not in some post scarcity utopia. We are rapidly running out of real-estate. Yes we can build up but many was not meant to live in endless concrete jungle, most people don't really want to, but the consequence of unbound population growth (which does seem to be slowing, for reasons of scarcity) would be ecological collapse as we take to much away from the remaining natural spaces.
The cost of energy is also going up. Wind and Solar don't actually lower costs, if they did they the oil majors would be building them at the same time they develop fields. you can't make money on window and solar without major tax subsides and fake "green" programs, where because you are in a "green industry" you get side step the impact studies and mitigation requirements any other commercial activity would be required to support/execute/subjected to, whales and birds be damned. - Energy will either continue to increase in cost until someone can make money in wind or we will develop new Fossil resources, but those will also be more costly as the recovery complexity only goes up as we deplete them.
The costs of food continues to rise, yes yes distribution not production problem, blah blah blah.. Might be/likely is true about being able to feed everyone for quite sometime by reducing waste vs output growth, but right now there is no *viable* plan to reduce waste on that scale, and the costs of production are rising, inputs like chemical fertilizer are not getting cheaper and they wont.
As bizarre as it seems we are circling back around the scarcity being about basic needs like food and shelter, because advanced manufacturing has made what ancient man saw as luxury very abundant. In most of the USA $15 will put a very powerful computer and communications platform in the palm of your hand, but it will barely feed you a week at the grocery store - (think homemade pancakes from scratch for two meals, and canned veg/beans for dinners). We have luxury poverty, where people can get some very nice things, but yet can't afford the most basic things they need. Why because there is real scarcity under those basic things.
The answer to most of this, is actually reset the international systems. Every nation/region needs to find away to sustainability produce enough food for their own population. Nations that are net importers of food or have net emigration should be subjected to heavy trade, travel, and monetary, sanctions by other nations. That will force them to fix their economic balance and focus on the right kinds of production. It will also re-balance more developed nations. There are lot of people that just are not fit to work in high-tech, and there are not enough jobs in 'trades' and ditch digging to provide a long term outlet. We actually need economics that allow workers to earn a living wage for 'low-complexity' activities like seamstress, and basic furniture jointing etc; put another way we need enough protectionism to that the domestic appetite for basic household items is satisfied primarily from domestic sources. - Capitalism at the domestic scale will work well for organizing that, after all it did in the past. Capitalism applied at the globalscale, with nationalistic actors looking to game the system will continue to fail.
You're talking about costs and making it seem as if costs are driven by scarcity. Costs are driven by market leaders, which increase costs because profits have to go up. Even if population outright fell, costs would continue to climb because LINE MUST GO UP.
Capitalism is failing right now specifically because it doesn't matter how big or small the scale, there will always be some player wanting to game it. And since we absolutely insist on letting capitalism run with no guardrails at all, it's creating scar
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costs are driven by scarcity. At least for the things like energy, food, and shelter I mentioned. Nobody is hording corn or fertilizer. Its expensive because the supplies are down.
Nobody is charging more for electricity because they pushing it all into some secret battery some place (or pumped reservoir for that matter), nor are they idling their generation facilities. They are charging more because more people want to use more of it then can be produced and delivered reliably. Now i do believe we could h
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costs are driven by scarcity. At least for the things like energy, food, and shelter I mentioned. Nobody is hording corn or fertilizer. Its expensive because the supplies are down.
Energy is being hoarded by the already haves. We throw away as much food as we use, because it's cheaper than distributing it where it's needed. Shelter is also being hoarded by the already haves, in buy-up scams to drive the market ever upward. Tons of homeless people, and folks that own more than three houses all so they can rent at exorbitant prices to those who can barely afford it.
Nobody is charging more for electricity because they pushing it all into some secret battery some place (or pumped reservoir for that matter), nor are they idling their generation facilities. They are charging more because more people want to use more of it then can be produced and delivered reliably. Now i do believe we could have much cheaper energy. That supposes winding the clock way back and making policy choices that would have favored the production gas, and oil fired generating plants, more domestic pipelines, and more domestic oil refining facility.
I'd also say there's no real need to push massive energy strains from the already have sector that will absolutely stress t
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how to say you're a dumb fuck without making it explicit.
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There's always corporate feudalism. Yay!
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Apartments will be cheaper because the robots will build them. How will UBI not lead to anything good? There's already a percentage of the population that live off inheritance or investment and they're fine.
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Welfare and "universal basic income" mean that there's still work being done; it's just that the people not doing the working are getting the benefit. As with Russell's hereditary landowners, "their idleness is rendered possible only by the industry of others".
Re: Good on them (Score:2)
What if we can each do the work we want, aided by AI, without needing a boss or profit motive?
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Then you've found Sir Thomas More's Utopia. As the name implies, you haven't.
Re:Good on them (Score:4, Interesting)
"It takes four hundred thirty people to man a starship. With this, you don't need anyone. One machine can do all those things they send men out to do now. Men no longer need die in space, or on some alien world. Men can live, and go on to achieve greater things than fact-finding and dying for galactic space, which is neither ours to give or to take. They can't understand. We don't want to destroy life, we want to save it!" - Dr Daystrom
If you ignore the plot of the episode (where M5 is doing buggy shit and taking Daystrom's sanity with it), I think his speech sums up my outlook on technological progress pretty well. If somewhere, someone is toiling, that's an error to be corrected. In a weird way, creating the fat slobs of WALL-E is, in fact, the goal. (Though for some reason, I prefer to picture Hedonismbot from Futurama as my true ideal.)
As for how to solve the resulting "finally, we can all afford to be fat slobs, so now we are all fat slobs" problem, I dunno, someone else can worry about that. ;-)
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Amazon has been fairly open that automation of the Fulfillment Center jobs has been the goal for years, this is why they even sponsor pick-and-pack robot competitions. I remember here on SlashDot when Amazon bought Kiva Systems there was widespread scoffing at the likelihood that they would be successful in implementing the system, now there are over a million robots in FCs around the world and the cost savings are enormous. During orientation new FC contractors are told that they're going to automate tho
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All true. But see the self-harming idiots mod you into oblivion. And that is why sanity does not prevail.
What's the big deal here? (Score:1)
I don't understand what's the big deal here? Isn't automation as old as man himself?
Leaked documents show that James Watt was trying to invent a machine that runs on steam and can power locomotives, power flour mills and looms and what not. Putting millions of workers out of job. Leaked documents show an early man was trying to invent the wheel. He was plotting to make it easy to move things around, putting thousands of men who carry shit around with their bare hands, out of work. Charles Babbage was schemi
This is the big deal. (Score:3, Insightful)
Not just any previous form of innovation and progress, served up the exact same answer for employment disruption. Every damn one of them did. They ALL had the same generic answer; go re-educate yourself.
AI is not targeting a trade or industry. It is targeting the human mind. That is exactly why this revolution, IS different. AI isn’t enabling Greed to make humans temporarily unemployed. It’s looking to make humans permanently unemployable.
Perhaps we grasp that reality about as well as peo
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The automation Amazon referenced, is not AI, but "robotic" automation. But let's go with your premise.
There are only two groups of educated people who think AI will be able to "replace the human mind":
1. AI company CEOs and marketers
2. YouTube influencers who make money selling scary stories
Those of us who have actually *used* AI, have very little fear of "being replaced." We can see that it boosts productivity, but it's very, very far from "replacing the human mind." In fact, it's so boneheaded, it's laugh
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The automation Amazon referenced, is not AI, but "robotic" automation. But let's go with your premise.
There are only two groups of educated people who think AI will be able to "replace the human mind": 1. AI company CEOs and marketers 2. YouTube influencers who make money selling scary stories
Those of us who have actually *used* AI, have very little fear of "being replaced." We can see that it boosts productivity, but it's very, very far from "replacing the human mind." In fact, it's so boneheaded, it's laughable. It's only useful in the hands of skilled users who can sift through the dumbness and pull the good out of it.
If it’s so boneheaded and laughable, then explain the tens of thousands that have been laid off in the tech sector in the last few years? Either the reason is because CEOs know damn well that AI can and will replace human workers, or there’s been a Recession denied for so corruptly long that we’re lying our way right into an even Greater Depression.
Either scenario, isn’t good for us meatsacks still reliant on a job to survive. Literally. There’s also a third group you and ev
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explain the tens of thousands that have been laid off in the tech sector in the last few years
It's simple. In the wake of COVID, the tech sector over-hired. The layoffs were largely a correction. https://www.indeed.com/career-... [indeed.com].
AI is more than enough to replace the good enough human worker that was hired because they were good enough
Not at all. AI make truly boneheaded mistakes *all the time*. It cannot be trusted to do anything without very close supervision. Even when you tell it to correct a mistake, it's equally likely to introduce a new mistake. The many lawyers who are being reprimanded for AI-generated briefs, is just the tip of the iceberg. https://www.npr.org/2025/07/10... [npr.org].
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explain the tens of thousands that have been laid off in the tech sector in the last few years
It's simple. In the wake of COVID, the tech sector over-hired. The layoffs were largely a correction. https://www.indeed.com/career-... [indeed.com].
AI is more than enough to replace the good enough human worker that was hired because they were good enough
Not at all. AI make truly boneheaded mistakes *all the time*. It cannot be trusted to do anything without very close supervision. Even when you tell it to correct a mistake, it's equally likely to introduce a new mistake. The many lawyers who are being reprimanded for AI-generated briefs, is just the tip of the iceberg. https://www.npr.org/2025/07/10... [npr.org].
Tip of the iceberg indeed. The lawyers who got caught, are being reprimanded. Much like college customers and ChatGPT, the other 95% won’t give a shit until they are.
And quite frankly, it takes more than a bonehead to pass the bar exam. If lawyers are already using AI Dumbass at work, then it’s likely for every reason and legal loophole buried in the future AI EULA they know damn well you still won’t read. So don’t worry about them. They already know what they will get away with.
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You're kind of missing the (inflection) point (Score:2)
And the AI and automation will also be better than 90% of humans at whatever new "replacement" jobs people or AIs come up with as a spin-off of the new automated economy.
T
Ambitious goals, all the best (Score:2)
Those are very ambitious goals, good luck with that! If they can achieve even half of what the "leaked documents" show, that itself will be great big progress for humanity.
Quit it (Score:2)
Jobs are resource necessary to live (Score:4, Funny)
But I'm sure it's fine. It's not like we had multiple world wars when unemployment got too high right?
Don't Google that.
And we certainly aren't putting incompetent dictators in charge of large militaries. That would be crazy.
Don't Google that either.
Re: Jobs are resource necessary to live (Score:2)
What if we can get the resources necessary to live on our own without needing quid pro quo trade with money? What if enclosure creates scarcity and dependence and the tragedy of privatization is far far worse than commons?
Well that's socialism (Score:2, Troll)
It's the old 4 to 14 problem. Anything you are taught in the age group of 4 to 14 sinks into your brain and you can't get it out without doing a process called deconstruction.
Religious extremists make heavy use of it but it works for basically anything
so when I first went into high school at the age of 14 I had a economics class that consisted of a fe
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Yep, and the carriage drivers and farriers were all unemployed forever too.
I mean they weren't (Score:3)
I get that you are coping with what's happening but coping isn't going to help you or anyone you care about.
This isn't something you can just use a thought terminating cliche to dismiss. This is real. This is happening. And if you're under 65 it's going to hit you before long.
If you're over 65 you might get to die before the ultra wealthy raid savings account and/or 401k and your social security and o
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They could learn a different trade.
Now? An AI can learn a thousand different trades in the time it takes you to learn one. Good luck.
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You'll notice that even Amazon's rosy predictions, say they hope to keep their number of employees *flat* rather than continuing to *grow.* They have no hope of zeroing out their workforce, not even close.
Those who think employment is about to go away, are drinking way, WAY too much Kool-aid.
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This is why you see so much push against immigration. We're all competing with immigrants for a shrinking number of jobs.
That would be fine if the wealth being generated got spread around but that's not how it works so...
The problem is anti-immigration sentiment usually comes with authoritarian fascism. It
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This is why you see so much push against immigration
No. The push against immigration is pure xenophobia and racism. The farmers who voted for Trump because he was going to deport all the "illegals" are now crying because they can't find enough workers to work their farms. You'll notice that Trump isn't deporting Europeans or Canadians, just people with brown skin.
I will repeat my main point:
Those who think employment is about to go away (because of AI), are drinking way, WAY too much Kool-aid.
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Nobody owes you a job.
As long as there are people, there will be wants and needs to fulfill. If you cannot find something useful to do in order to earn a living, you are not trying. Make your own job -don't wait for someone else to provide you with a job.
We definitely need a better support system for those who are in need, but that is not the same as demanding that others provide for you. That is the (false) equivalence that MAGA is trying to make: "we can't help people, or they will never do for themsel
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tl;dr
Keep up doing your shit work forever.
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It's funny that's what you read there. Very...insightful. About you, not about the subject.
As we have free public education in this country, and at least in MN there are ample programs to allow low income people to get at least 2yr and many 4yr degrees for basically nothing (as well as whole government offices at the city, county, and state levels with staff to help the un- and underemployed apply for and secure these opportunities) there's nearly no reason these people can't improve their opportunities.
(
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BOT account.
Bezos be like.... (Score:2)
1% (Score:1, Informative)
I've also know people who worked procurement at Amazon. One girl said if they hire 30 for the warehouse, 15~20 actually show up. Less than 10 make it past four weeks. She once had to figure out where a bunch of missing hours went, and found a hidden stash near one of the roof exits with Nintendo switches,
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Can they automated the ads away? (Score:2)
Heck I'd be OK if they even used AI for it.
That's fine (Score:2)
Does anyone else remember (Score:2)
No problem then (Score:1)
From: Amazon is such a horrible place to work to.. (Score:2)