How dairy robots are changing work for cows and farmers

How come no one makes fun of agriculture in america ?

If we can successfully produce agricultural products in America why is manufacturing impossible?

This again!

We manufacture plenty in America. Every company that I've worked for over the last 30 years has manufactured something or the other. We just don't manufacture cheap stuff like toasters.

Very small % of our workforce works in the farm.

Also I think we manufactured a lot more things/value with a same number of people like 10 years ago but with mostly automated.

America has never had more manufacturing than it does now. American manufacturing is hugely successful. It doesn't get the attention it deserves because:

1. 70% of it takes place in rural areas. Most people are completely oblivious to anything that happens outside of cities so can feel like manufacturing doesn't exist.

2. Automation has removed the need for most labor involvement so that manufacturing doesn't appeal to the "dey took 'er jerbs" crowd.

While there are many similarities, agriculture is not treated the same way because:

1. Agriculture more or less entirely takes place in rural areas, so it is completely out of mind. 30% of manufacturing happens in cities so it still visible, even though it looks sparse.

2. American agriculture is pushing the limits of how much agriculture can take place. There is still some underutilization, like CRP lands, but the wall would be hit pretty quickly if there was a serious push to expand production. There is no apparent wall for manufacturing.

3. It is, for the most part, many generations removed so there is no connection to it. Most families haven't farmed since their great, great, great grand pappy's time. Whereas many families still have living relatives who were around when manufacturing was the major employer and they get to hear about "the good old days".

Or cheap stuff like $3,000 laptops?

What's the profit margin on that laptop?

Exactly like a $3,000 laptop. $3,000 is insanely cheap when you think about it. With a $3,000 laptop in hand you can produce more value for the world than with tools that cost millions of dollars. Economies of scale is a weird and wonderful thing.

For Apple (which is what I had in mind) I think they aim for 50%.

I’m not sure I’d agree with that. A skilled person can use a laptop to create a lot of value, but a laptop on its own isn’t going to produce much. (And a skilled programmer could produce nearly as much value with a $300 laptop.)

What value do you think a multi-million dollar passenger jet creates own its own, absent a skilled pilot and crew? But where skilled operators are at the helm, the laptop has the potential to create considerably more value, yet costs almost nothing. It is really quite amazing how cheap they have become. Early general-purpose computers did cost about as much as a jet, so them becoming dirt cheap wasn't a foregone conclusion. But we're lucky they did.

We can know the value of something by simply conducting an auction and seeing what it sells for; that's the floor of its value. We can establish the ceiling of its value by seeing what it retails for. Fancy Apple laptops float around $3,000. They're not worth more than that, and not worth less.