考研阅读精选：法国和自动化：无人驾驶，人无工作
『无人驾驶的地铁列车不仅是新科技的产物，也是严厉的劳动法催生的结果。』France and automation: Driverless, workless
法国和自动化：无人驾驶，人无工作
Nov 26, 2011 | from The Economist
http://images.koolearn.com/casupload/upload/fckeditorUpload/2011-12-12/image/6858c1a5d89543dfae6f0ce9121c7643.jpg
THE bold fuchsia-pink and tangerine-orange stripes of the upholsteryare shocking enough, but the really unsettling feature of the new trainson the Paris metro is the lack of a driver. Sit in front and you get apicture-window forward view as the train tears through a dark tunnel.This month, the first automatic trains went into service on line one,the capital’s busiest, running from La Défense to the Château deVincennes. With trains guided remotely from a control room andprotective platform-edge barriers, the new trains seem to operateentirely on their own.
At a launch ceremony all the talk was ofengineering and operational prowess. Paris already has driverless trainson line 14, the world’s first fully automatic underground line. Butthat was built from scratch. Never before has such an old line, this onedating to 1900, been re-equipped with reconfigured platforms and newelectronics, for driverless trains. On a line that carries 725,000passengers a day, and despite difficult talks with trade unions, all thework took place without a shutdown.
The main aim is betterservice. By eliminating human error, driverless trains are“incomparably” safer, says Gérard Churchill, in charge of installing theautomatic line. Since opening in 1998, line 14 has had no accidents.Trains can run closer together. Extra services can be laid on at thelast minute during unexpectedly busy times. But could there be anotherunspoken benefit? Driverless trains cannot go on strike. “It was not anobjective,” insists Mr Churchill. “But it is true that, duringindustrial unrest, automatic trains are much more reliable.”
Strict labour laws, costly payroll charges and erratic strikes seem tomake French firms especially keen on technology. Supermarkets, forinstance, have enthusiastically adopted self-checkout tills. “All Frenchhypermarkets have adopted this strategy over the past few years,” saysAlexis Lecanuet at Accenture, a consultancy. The idea is to speed upqueues at peak times for impatient non-technophobes carrying lightbaskets. But it also cuts costs. “Self-checkout has worked better incountries where labour is expensive,” says Serguei Netessine, aprofessor at INSEAD, a business school.
France excels athigh-tech services: credit-card operated petrol stations, touch-screenfast-food counters, automatic car-washing. Two years ago, McDonaldspioneered the use of touch-screen, credit-card-based ordering in itsFrench fast-food restaurants. Eléphant Bleu, a self-servicehigh-pressure car-washing chain, has 472 outlets in France, and isexpanding. All this in a country where the labour code runs to over3,300 pages, an employer pays an average of 39% in payroll taxes, andunemployment is at 10%. Spot the connection. (428 words)
文章地址：http://www.economist.com/node/21540284
页:
[1]