Any time legislators give tax incentives to corporations, they must inquire about artificial intelligence and negotiate iron-clad deals. Journalists also have an obligation to research companies’ past histories with robotics.

Interpersonal Divide posted about Foxconn’s planned Wisconsin plant in July 2017, proclaiming “Say Hi to C-3PO.” At the time few politicians mentioned how Foxconn replaces workers with robots.

Foxconn’s use of artificial intelligence was covered in Interpersonal Divide in the Age of the Machine:

In 2016, Foxconn Technology Group, an Apple and Samsung supplier in China, replaced 60,000 workers with robots. If any country should be concerned about automation, China might top that list with its population of 1.35 billion people. In reporting the mass firing—a population larger than Pensacola, Florida—the British Broadcasting Company noted that economists “have issued dire warnings about how automation will affect the job market, with one report, from consultants Deloitte in partnership with Oxford University, suggesting that 35% of jobs were at risk over the next 20 years.” See: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36376966

Earlier plans to build the Wisconsin plant promised jobs to thousands of blue-collar workers making LCD screens. That changed this week. Reuters reports that Foxconn Technology Group “said it intends to hire mostly engineers and researchers rather than the manufacturing workforce the project originally promised.”

The British wire service also reported that Foxconn’s “technology hub” in Wisconsin “would largely consist of research facilities along with packaging and assembly operations.”  The report quoted a company spokesperson: “In Wisconsin we’re not building a factory. You can’t use a factory to view our Wisconsin investment.”

As companies ask states for tax incentives to build plants, promising thousands of jobs for local residents, legislators have a responsibility to make iron-clad deals. This remains an essential discussion as the state of Wisconsin may be paying as much as $2 billion in incentives, according to a report in the Chicago Tribune. The Tribune was one of the few U.S. newspapers to cite the mass firing of Foxconn workers in China to increase profit by replacing them with robots.

Any time a new plant is announced, involving tax incentives, journalists need to monitor how robotics are going to be used.

Interpersonal Divide warns that artificial intelligence and robotics are going to replace jobs across the manufacturing sector: “Two-thirds of Americans believe that robots will do much of the work currently being done by people, according to the Pew Research Center; however, 80 percent of respondents believe that their own jobs and professions will be largely unaffected.”

The only way to know in advance is to put companies on record concerning artificial intelligence and negotiate contracts that companies like Foxconn have to honor. 

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