A few decades ago, the dream of nearly every American was to one day own a car. In the current era, this dream has become reality for the majority of the population. A 2001 report published by the Energy Information Administration showed that on average America alone has about 1.79 cars per household (“Household Vehicles Energy,” 2005). With all the luxuries and technologies made available to Americans, the United States has proven that it is one of the most advanced nations in the world. Now ask yourself: What would America be like without the advanced technology it has today? Culture and life would be much more diverse and complicated for almost every human being. Furthermore, some of today's most important jobs would not exist. Obviously, at some point in history this was the case and all types of construction were done with hand tools and nothing else. That all changed during the industrial age, when human-powered machines helped replace the manual labor of artisans. Today this is known as mechanization. It wasn't until the 19th century that Americans took it a step further and automation was born. Automation is the automatic operation and control of machinery capable of making decisions without human intervention (Plotkin, 2009). As you might expect, automation has its advantages and disadvantages. This form of production can lead to employment problems for society because human labor is not required. However, by replacing human workers with technology, higher quality products can be produced at lower costs (“Automation,” 2010). Therefore, when you balance the positive and negative factors of automation, it is clear that it has a beneficial impact on American society. A...... half of the document ...... launch[Vol. 10]. (Adobe Digital Edition), Retrieved from http://www.springer.com/computer/image+processing/book/978-0-387-78880-7Jenkins, D. (2005, August 2). Survey Reveals PC and Console Ownership Data. Retrieved from http://www.gamasutra.com /php-bin/news_index.php?story=6094Plotkin, R. (Producer). (2009). The Future of Invention (2 of 8): History of Invention Automation. [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWuDil0j2YcRobot News: Advantages and Disadvantages of Automation with Industrial Robots. (2008, February 11). Retrieved from http://www.robots.com/blog.php?tag=112Vassar, M. (n.d.). Flexible automated production. Retrieved from http://lifeboat.com/ex/flexible.automated.manufacturing