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posted by martyb on Monday October 14 2019, @02:56PM   Printer-friendly
from the wages-vs-prices dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Billionaire Jack Ma, long an outspoken advocate for China's extreme work culture, says that people should be able to work just 12 hours a week with the benefits of artificial intelligence.

People could work as little as three days a week, four hours a day with the help of technology advances and a reform in education systems, the Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. co-founder said at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai Thursday. He spoke on-stage with Elon Musk, the chief executive officer of Tesla Inc. who is building manufacturing facilities in the city.

[...] Just this year, Ma endorsed the China tech sector's infamous 12-hours-a-day, six-days-a-week routine, so common it earned the moniker 996. In one blog post, China's richest man this year dismissed people who expect a typical eight-hour office lifestyle, defying a growing popular backlash.

"I don't worry about jobs," Ma said on Thursday, making an optimistic case that AI will help humans rather than just eliminate their work. "Computers only have chips, men have the heart. It's the heart where the wisdom comes from."

-- submitted from IRC


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by meustrus on Monday October 14 2019, @06:23PM

    by meustrus (4961) on Monday October 14 2019, @06:23PM (#907074)

    Let's say company A implements this 12 hour week. Company B does 20. At the same level of efficiency per hour, company B wins on employee overhead. Always. And their workers have more time to think of innovations because their head is in the game more of the time.

    I just don't see industrialism scaling down. It was developed to be good at scaling up.

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