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mahatmakanejeeves

(56,897 posts)
Sun Nov 28, 2021, 07:45 AM Nov 2021

Five myths about the supply chain

Outlook • Perspective

Five myths about the supply chain

No, self-driving trucks wouldn’t fix all our problems

By Rob Handfield
Rob Handfield is the Bank of America university distinguished professor of supply chain management at North Carolina State University and director of the Supply Chain Resource Cooperative.

November 24, 2021 at 2:07 p.m. EST

Shelves are empty. Online orders take much longer to arrive. The media are warning of a Christmas devoid of presents. The supply chain has probably affected you firsthand in some way, the shock of expensive or absent products likely throwing your world out of whack and bringing mild panic. But there are several prominent myths circulating about the supply crunch and its causes.

Myth No. 1

Self-driving trucks would
solve the driver shortage.


Autonomous trucks “would improve supply-chain efficiency by increasing the speed and reliability of deliveries and by mitigating the shortage of truck drivers, which contributes to delays at ports and throughout the supply chain,” a Barrons essay argued last month. “Driverless trucks can’t arrive soon enough,” Axios proclaimed in November.

But we’re a very long way off from automation fixing our problems. The technology simply doesn’t meet safety standards, especially in cities where roads, wind and speed limits change, and pedestrians don’t always adhere to walk signs and crosswalks. Drivers must survey the landscape and react on a dime, with instinctive decisions based on broad observations. Machines aren’t there yet, as Duke engineering professor Missy Cummings, hired last month as a special adviser to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, told me recently.

A more realistic approach to the driver shortage is to improve the efficiency with which we deploy trucks. The lines are killer, as evidenced by the Los Angeles port, where the images of backed up trucks resemble a Black Friday frenzy outside a store with one guy working the register. Between the wait to get in the port, the line to pick up the container and a wait to leave, the ordeal can take each driver up to eight hours — which is why most trucking companies are steering clear of ports. Independent drivers are paid a fixed fee per pickup, so they lose money sitting in these lines.

{snip}

Twitter: @Robhandfield

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Five myths about the supply chain (Original Post) mahatmakanejeeves Nov 2021 OP
I agree with pretty much all the points stated. Sherman A1 Nov 2021 #1
Agree WA-03 Democrat Nov 2021 #2

Sherman A1

(38,958 posts)
1. I agree with pretty much all the points stated.
Sun Nov 28, 2021, 08:08 AM
Nov 2021

#5 regarding “Just in Time” inventory spells out the distortion of the original concept along with the over reliance on it. It it there I see lies the major problem with the current supply chain. As corporations chased cheaper and cheaper production costs the lines stretched farther and farther away. Any hiccup means the product is not going to be there “just in time,” a world wide pandemic causes it to unravel as we have seen.

The corporation got their lower cost production as intended, currently the also have scored no or limited products to use or sell. This is the market at work as intended. The blame for empty shelves and storage lots of vehicles waiting for the correct micro chips lays in the corner office of the ivory tower of corporate America.

WA-03 Democrat

(3,017 posts)
2. Agree
Sun Nov 28, 2021, 11:45 AM
Nov 2021

Just In Time works under a lot of pre-planned conditions including location. Half way around the world is not JIT. Dr. Demming and Japan refined it to a high art.

The great manufacturing exodus was driving by financial pressure to max profits and return OPEX and CAPEX to shareholders.

Mission accomplished now figure out how to ship products to customers when something goes wrong. Once you lose pressure in the pipeline getting it back is hard.

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