We know that poor employee health can negatively affect productivity. A recent study suggests that poor community health leads to lower worker productivity, as well. People who live in areas with poor community health – higher prevalence of poverty, homelessness, family dysfunction, drug use, and care giving burdens – were more likely to get to work late or miss work altogether.
We should strive for good community health regardless of the effect that it has on manufacturing. It’s great that improved community health leads to improved productivity, but that’s really just icing on the cake. Technology continues to get better and automation is taking on a bigger role in manufacturing.
History tells us that people will always have a place in manufacturing, but it’s possible that community health could have less of an impact on overall productivity in the future. We continue to automate those difficult, dangerous, and dull manufacturing jobs. Today’s workers don’t share their parents’ appreciation for grinding out a hard day of factory work. Times are different, and young workers may lack the focus and physical stamina to tackle low-skill labor in manufacturing. Fortunately, they don’t have to.
Automation continues to remove humans from the factory jobs that we now deem “undesirable”. This is true in many other industries as well. We have machines and automated systems improving work and rearrange workers in practically every industry.
The health of a community is undoubtedly important, and it’s always going to affect worker productivity. However, the impact of poor community health could wane with the increasing use of automation. Machines aren’t really affected by an unhealthy community. Less taxing and less physically demanding work means that people don’t have to work as hard.
Either way, it’s important to keep your industrial machinery running the way that it’s supposed to. Call 479-422-0390 for immediate repair, maintenance, and support for Indramat servos, controls, and drives.