China and the Revenge of the Sith.

Robot Wars? Last year China bought 36,560 robots, up 60% from 2012, replacing Japan as the world’s biggest buyer of automatons. Japan bought 26,015 and the US, in third position, 23,679.  This was according to an FT article on page one on Monday. 

Problem solved bionically? I was reminded of the above today, when the FT (p6) discussed Japan’s declining workforce.  Last year Japan’s population declined by about 200,000 (0.17%), so we can estimate that the workforce dropped by 120,000.  But if the new robots work three shifts plus the weekends, a robot might be the equivalent of four human workers.  This means the Japan’s workforce was basically flat on a robot-adjusted basis, and soon it may be growing.