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Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Online Retail Boom Means More Warehouse Workers, And Robots To Accompany Them

There's a good chance something you've bought online has been in the hands of a "picker" first. These are the workers in warehouses who pick, pack and ship all those things we're ordering.

At Amazon and other companies, they're working side by side with robots. Experts say while the robots are replacing some human workers, the machines aren't quite ready to take over completely.

To keep pace with a growing hunger for fast delivery, more pickers are being hired in the distribution industry. And on the outskirts of the Bay Area, a school is using technology to train students in these new jobs.

Patterson High School is about two hours east of San Francisco. It's surrounded by the farmland of California's Central Valley, which produces half of the country's fruits, vegetables and nuts. But this group of students isn't learning how to be farmers. They're training to work in warehouses.

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I even order ac/furnace filters online. Don't need to drive to store, park, deal with rude cashiers and pay less on amazon or jet than the local stores. Why bother burning my gas to pay higher prices?. UPS/FEDEX brings it to me and it's usually free.

Anonymous said...

SKYNET!!!!

Anonymous said...

Amazon Prime was a no-brainer for us. 2 day free shipping (even on Sundays), deals, and the music and video that comes along with it, including some excellent Amazon productions.
We got the Amazon Prime credit card, too, that give 5% off all Prime purchases and 1-3& off every other purchase, online or not.

Anonymous said...

Sounds great, but killing small businesses. I guess it is just a sign of the times. It used to be Walmart, now it is Amazon. We'll keep fighting