Automation in the US currently means two digital ordering kiosks and one person on the register at Mickey D's, instead of two or three people on the register. They're not automating anyone's jobs out of existence, they're just cutting people's hours and fucking up their schedules to minimize labor costs.
Edit: not saying this to argue or even disagree with you. Burger flipping bots are not on the horizon.
It's not even automation, it's offloading the job of reporting orders from cashiers to the customer! Now I punch in the thing that tells the people in the back to make my burger order, instead of a cashier punching it in and printing out an order-slip and handing it back there. Credit cards automated who counts the money in a transaction, but VISA doesn't get to use the 'automation' buzzword.
Self-Checkouts are especially annoying for this, you expect me to properly type in product codes for produce instead of having a cashier who knows the code for romaine lettuce off the top of their head! You didn't automate any labour away, you just rearranged who does it, made it take longer, and I don't even get a discount for doing a job you should hire someone else to do.
Automating jobs out of existence is one way of viewing it, another is that the socially necessary labour time required to transform so many shipments of frozen burgers and french fries into so much sold fast food is adjusting.
As someone who's eaten a lot of fast food, it doesn't seem to me that they actually cut back on workers. There was always just one or maybe two folks working the registers. Maybe the kiosks prevent lines from forming as much but not like that gets you your food any faster as there are still likely the same number of workers, as the automatic burger flipper has yet to be invented...
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Automation in the US currently means two digital ordering kiosks and one person on the register at Mickey D's, instead of two or three people on the register. They're not automating anyone's jobs out of existence, they're just cutting people's hours and fucking up their schedules to minimize labor costs.
Edit: not saying this to argue or even disagree with you. Burger flipping bots are not on the horizon.
That is automating jobs out of existence, it's just at a much smaller scale (and with worse results) than what was hyped.
It's not even automation, it's offloading the job of reporting orders from cashiers to the customer! Now I punch in the thing that tells the people in the back to make my burger order, instead of a cashier punching it in and printing out an order-slip and handing it back there. Credit cards automated who counts the money in a transaction, but VISA doesn't get to use the 'automation' buzzword.
Self-Checkouts are especially annoying for this, you expect me to properly type in product codes for produce instead of having a cashier who knows the code for romaine lettuce off the top of their head! You didn't automate any labour away, you just rearranged who does it, made it take longer, and I don't even get a discount for doing a job you should hire someone else to do.
Great points. It's closer to shrinkflation than automation.
You can always give your self a five finger discount at self checkout.
Gotta remember to tip the cashier:putin-wink:
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deleted by creator
Automating jobs out of existence is one way of viewing it, another is that the socially necessary labour time required to transform so many shipments of frozen burgers and french fries into so much sold fast food is adjusting.
As someone who's eaten a lot of fast food, it doesn't seem to me that they actually cut back on workers. There was always just one or maybe two folks working the registers. Maybe the kiosks prevent lines from forming as much but not like that gets you your food any faster as there are still likely the same number of workers, as the automatic burger flipper has yet to be invented...