Fmr. McDonald's USA CEO: $35K Robots Cheaper Than Hiring at $15 Per Hour.

[Captain N]

So what? We should pay slave wages to keep people employed? There's no point in working a job if it can't support you.

Also hey guess what McDonalds? Robot workers don't buy burgers.

And when those burgers aren't bought, there's no reason to ship them, when there's no reason to ship them there's no reason to load the trucks, when there's no reason to load the trucks there's no reason to order the ingredients, etc.

It's like some people don't understand that if the lowest earner isn't purchasing items it starts effecting the rest of the jobs above them. I like to call it the Mosquito Effect. People think the mosquito is worthless yet take it out of the eco-system and you start causing ripples.

so a minimum effort lazy, no skill required, 36hr a week job should be a living wage. no, fuck you entitled shit, get a second job, be creative. If base pay fast food employees had the motivation and drive to do their current job well and not fuck it up almost every single time i go to one of these places, then maybe i'd agree they deserve a living wage, but they can't, so they don't.

I was making 8-12/hr for almost 10 years at various jobs. you know what i fucking did, I worked my ass off and slowly got small raises and opportunities to get paid more and take on better jobs within the company. If I needed more money for bills and rent and food, I'd go to a junkyard and pull parts i could sell on craigslist and ebay, and make up the difference there. So if I saw people working their ass off at every fast food joint and my order was almost always correct then i would agree with you, but if all I get is shit service and shit attitudes from people that can't be bothered to do their job correctly, then I could care less.

There are jobs like call centers that have no barrier to entry that pay well that you can do from home and have great performance bonuses, and all you need is a damn pulse to get a job there, you can even be a felon, and you don't even have to live in the same damn city! They usually even pay for your phone. Sorry i don't have sympathy for people who want to make a living wage on minimum effort and I could care less if you think less of me for it.

for the record I only feel this way about entry level fast food jobs. not managers or anyone working at any regular restaurant and/or bars. all the rest of those i think deserve higher pay...

Nobody gives a shit about your anecdotal evidence. It does not apply to societal levels -- It would be the same as me claiming that if you do as I do you too can make a six figure income. That's not possible and there's more people who are likely to fail than there are too succeed. What you did is fantastic for you....It doesn't work when you tell a mass group of people just "Do Better because I did"

[Deleted]

The general point, however, is that the jobs lost in front-line cashier positions are made up elsewhere in the economy. There is no observable increase in unemployment due to minimum wage hikes, historically. Narrowing it down to look at the effect on one company is pretty irrelevant. A single company going bankrupt, by way of example, does not mean the economy is collapsing.

While this is true, generally, we are now on the cusp of a massive robotic revolution. The type of jobs getting replaced are those that employ a lot of people such as transportation, food service, factory work etc. Those kind of jobs will not be easily replaced by an increased demand in customer service technicians, engineers and service technicians. New markets will no doubt emerge to make up for the short fall so it's probably not as dire as some predict.

As a side note i watch the news today where truck drivers in Sweden (the third most common profession) are complaining about all the automated trucks going in to service.

[Tyrianth]

Wow if you can get a 4 year degree as CS major in less than a year and nobody hires your ass they are missing out.

When did I say he got in less than a year? Try rereading it.

And you should probably actually try commenting on my post? In a world where everyone is an engineer what are those who are less desirable supposed to do? Nobody want's to hire someone who's on the verge of retiring, especially when 10's if not 100's of millions of people are getting laid off and looking for work. What should these people do? The current welfare system won't be able to support that many people. There is too much overheard and red tape. Condensing all forms of welfare into one makes it more efficient and cheaper for the government.

[Deleted]

Actually no where have I advocated against automation, so there's that. It is a statistical fact, that if 1 person can run 4 machines that do the work of 4 people, that means there are 3 less people at that job. This is not conspiracy theory, this is not tin foil hat, this is the most basic kind of math that a child would know. What I have been saying, had you spent the time reading instead of trying to insult people, is that something has to give if the amount of automation continues in the way it currently is.




Which means that in the current system you are now saying it went from being able to get out of highschool with 0 debt to get an entry level job, to having to have tens of thousands of dollars of debt after collage, to get the new standard of entry level job.



Sorting machines, packing machines, ones that installed the bolts and bearings on the bladed parts of the machine, ones that stocked the line for the manual labor to use and assemble, pallet loader/unloaders, wrappers, auto cart trollies that delivered the wrapped pallets to another station.. need I go on?

Those are extremely primitive and basic machines...

Making a burger is actually kuch harder then rolling each of those machines into one..

[Elbren]

Okay, bagging french fries? I agree.


But I'm not sure what else it could do. I don't think it could run the cash register.

It doesn't need to. A simple kiosk easily replaces half of the workforce in a fast food restaurant. Places like Target, Wal-Mart or any/every grocery store has had self-checkout registers for years.

The only people you really need are the cooks and someone to hand you the food at the drive-thru window and inside the restaurant. There may be ... what? 1-3 cooks on at any one time during the day? You'd only need about 3 employee's (on average) during a work shift.

Sounds like bullshit.

A company doesn't have morals besides what makes the most money. If robots where so much cheaper they would get them regardless.

It might be slightly cheaper but the price for maintenance and the complexity involved makes me hard to believe it would be a large gain.

You haven't seen this yet in the fast food industry because:

- current cost of minimum wage workers did not necessitate a move toward automation

- the upfront cost of buying/installing all of the automated hardware

- having to deal w/ the backlash of negative public response because you're effectively letting go of at least 70% of your low-income workforce

While a move to automation would improve profits, it wasn't enough to deal with any/all of the negatives, but a move to $15/hour minimum wage would easily justify this move.


As for the "price for maintainance", that's absolutely nothing compared to the amount of money saved by replacing thousands of workers. It's not like you'd have an on-hand tech guy in each store. You'd have a tech department that covers entire areas; probably multiple counties depending on the size of your state. Same as they have now that fix/repair any of the registers or kitchen hardware.

[Barnabas]

I'm sure those thousands of tradesmen knew they were going to end up out of a job in 2008. But yes you and I have had that conversation before....You blame the workers instead of circumstances outside of their control. Those 20+ year guys should just go get other skills because it was totally their fault the Housing Market crashed and they ended up out of work.

Oh boohoo their circumstances they can't control. If you can't be in charge of your own life then who else will? Plenty of tradesmen jobs are out there. I mean did we suddenly stop building houses after the crash? I've seen entire neighborhoods being built since then and more. Heard it here folks construction jobs don't exist after the housing crash.

[Wolfheart9]

so a minimum effort lazy, no skill required, 36hr a week job should be a living wage. no, fuck you entitled shit, get a second job, be creative. If base pay fast food employees had the motivation and drive to do their current job well and not fuck it up almost every single time i go to one of these places, then maybe i'd agree they deserve a living wage, but they can't, so they don't.

I was making 8-12/hr for almost 10 years at various jobs. you know what i fucking did, I worked my ass off and slowly got small raises and opportunities to get paid more and take on better jobs within the company. If I needed more money for bills and rent and food, I'd go to a junkyard and pull parts i could sell on craigslist and ebay, and make up the difference there. So if I saw people working their ass off at every fast food joint and my order was almost always correct then i would agree with you, but if all I get is shit service and shit attitudes from people that can't be bothered to do their job correctly, then I could care less.

There are jobs like call centers that have no barrier to entry that pay well that you can do from home and have great performance bonuses, and all you need is a damn pulse to get a job there, you can even be a felon, and you don't even have to live in the same damn city! They usually even pay for your phone. Sorry i don't have sympathy for people who want to make a living wage on minimum effort and I could care less if you think less of me for it.

for the record I only feel this way about entry level fast food jobs. not managers or anyone working at any regular restaurant and/or bars. all the rest of those i think deserve higher pay...

... Sooo in your reasoning that minimum wage people should work two jobs just to survive, your example is you working 10 years at above minimum wage..

[Tyrianth]

Oh boohoo their circumstances they can't control. If you can't be in charge of your own life then who else will? Plenty of tradesmen jobs are out there. I mean did we suddenly stop building houses after the crash? I've seen entire neighborhoods being built since then and more. So if anyone deserves an its you.

I love how you seem to think these jobs have unlimited positions and can consume the millions of people who will be displaced by automation.

[TexasRules]

a robotic arm couldn't, but you could easily have a robotic cash register... like a vending machine. type in what you want, it processes the order, put your money in and it dispenses change. there is really no reason for people to be working on checkouts at all

Wal Mart and grocery stores have had this for years. People just want to champion their agenda, hence stories like this.

[Wolfheart9]

I love how you seem to think these jobs have unlimited positions and can consume the millions of people who are displaced by automation.

You clearly just don't understand, jobs are a limitless resource, the only reason someone can't get employed is they don't want to silly! It has nothing to do with the economy, where you live, availability, competition in the field.. There are unlimited jobs!

[Alvito]

You are going to need engineers, you will need maintenance techs like you've pointed out, you will need programmers like you've pointed out, you will need sales people to sell them, you will need people in a call center to answer questions or schedule maintenance etc. There will be plenty of opportunities for people. I named a few. It will across industries to support the robotic industry. We are far from needing a basic income at this point. Somebody will need help with doing something. Everything will become cheaper so cost of living will plummet. it will turn into a race of having more robots than the next country to remain competitive. So that will create even more jobs.

Many of those jobs will be filled by people currently doing those types of jobs now. Some of those jobs ate a 1 and done type of job so it will be outsourced.

[Captain N]

Oh boohoo their circumstances they can't control. If you can't be in charge of your own life then who else will? Plenty of tradesmen jobs are out there. I mean did we suddenly stop building houses after the crash? I've seen entire neighborhoods being built since then and more. Heard it here folks construction jobs don't exist after the housing crash.

And as usual you missed the point. But as to be expected from you another goal post shift -- People don't know when they're going to lose their jobs which is what I quoted you on. That's the wonderful part of At-Will Employment...People can and are fired for no reason on a daily basis. Houses were built AFTER the crash yet...but during the crash many of those tradesmen ended up in low wage work because it was the only thing that was hiring. It took a great deal of time for those guys to get back to building houses...So go peddle your blame the worker bullshit elsewhere.

[Wolfheart9]

Wal Mart and grocery stores have had this for years. People just want to champion their agenda, hence stories like this.

And Wal Mart and grocery stores have cut down their staff.. as people said would happen?

[Sunseeker]

And when those burgers aren't bought, there's no reason to ship them, when there's no reason to ship them there's no reason to load the trucks, when there's no reason to load the trucks there's no reason to order the ingredients, etc.

It's like some people don't understand that if the lowest earner isn't purchasing items it starts effecting the rest of the jobs above them. I like to call it the Mosquito Effect. People think the mosquito is worthless yet take it out of the eco-system and you start causing ripples.

Exactly, and fast-food relies on the poor to buy their products. You cut off the poor's money, either by paying them to little or by firing them completely, and the end result is that money is LOST. Purchasing power goes DOWN, the economy SHRINKS. None of these things are positives for big corporations, Americans, or our nation, or shit, the world. As the largest consumer of...everything...in the world, the world depends on Americans buying shit, all the time, every day. Americans stop buying shit? Everyone gets hurt.

[Alvito]

You clearly just don't understand, jobs are a limitless resource, the only reason someone can't get employed is they don't want to silly! It has nothing to do with the economy, where you live, availability, competition in the field.. There are unlimited jobs!

That must be why cities had up to 40% unemployment in some cities, unlimited jobs.

[Tyrianth]

Many of those jobs will be filled by people currently doing those types of jobs now. Some of those jobs ate a 1 and done type of job so it will be outsourced.

To be fair automation WILL create jobs, 10s or 100s of thousands of jobs. It just also has the potential to displace millions of others...

[Wolfheart9]

That must be why cities had up to 40% unemployment in some cities, unlimited jobs.

I know right? Crazy.

[Barnabas]

When did I say he got in less than a year? Try rereading it.

And you should probably actually try commenting on my post? In a world where everyone is an engineer what are those who are less desirable supposed to do? Nobody want's to hire someone who's on the verge of retiring, especially when 10's if not 100's of millions of people are getting laid off and looking for work. What should these people do? The current welfare system won't be able to support that many people. There is too much overheard and red tape. Condensing all forms of welfare into one makes it more efficient and cheaper for the government.

Reread what? That he started saving when he was 45 and nobody hires 45 year old with a 4 year degree? Oh and now you want to reword another scenario I'm supposed to respond to. It must be my lucky day. How about figure out what type of job you can reasonably get in your situation then just I dunno go for it? When life gives you lemons take them. It's free shit.

[Deleted]

It doesn't need to. A simple kiosk easily replaces half of the workforce in a fast food restaurant. Places like Target, Wal-Mart or any/every grocery store has had self-checkout registers for years.

The only people you really need are the cooks and someone to hand you the food at the drive-thru window and inside the restaurant. There may be ... what? 1-3 cooks on at any one time during the day? You'd only need about 3 employee's (on average) during a work shift.



You haven't seen this yet in the fast food industry because:

- current cost of minimum wage workers did not necessitate a move toward automation

- the upfront cost of buying/installing all of the automated hardware

- having to deal w/ the backlash of negative public response because you're effectively letting go of at least 70% of your low-income workforce

While a move to automation would improve profits, it wasn't enough to deal with any/all of the negatives, but a move to $15/hour minimum wage would easily justify this move.


As for the "price for maintainance", that's absolutely nothing compared to the amount of money saved by replacing thousands of workers. It's not like you'd have an on-hand tech guy in each store. You'd have a tech department that covers entire areas; probably multiple counties depending on the size of your state. Same as they have now that fix/repair any of the registers or kitchen hardware.

Replacing three workers to hire a mechanic isn't a deal even with the pay raise.. people are weirdly viewing machines as some mythical force. They are going to need assistance and maintenance constantly. There is a reason they trying to make it such a scare factor they are playing with a bad hand and they know it.

[alexw]

I can see that point went over your head like Trumps Toupée.

No I perfectly understood your argument. That automation will occur in those places with higher minimum wages first which is why raising the minimum wage is a bad idea. But for your argument to have any validity you have to assume that automation is bad. So if it is bad then what about previous bouts of automation? Should we not go back to using the hand-scythe?