Automated fast-food and coffee shops are inevitable given the many problematic issues with hiring and dealing with low-end, unmotivated and uneducated workers, including unfounded worker lawsuits, obamacare, unemployment and workers comp insurance abuse and fraud, ridiculous minimum wage mandates, fascist National Labor Relations Board, obamacare, OSHA meddling and much, much more.
It’s not that difficult to fully automate most fast food operations. The only real issue is at what point it is less expensive to install fully automated mini-food factories in these restaurants than continue production with hand labor.
I suspect in 10 yrs the typical fast food place will have 2 employees per shift, basically to do logistics and sanitation. Each wage increase, additional government regulation of employees, obamacare, sabotage, wildcat strike, “civil disobedience” lawsuit, etc. provides yet another incentive for automation. Pretty soon fast food joints won’t be much more than fully automated self-serve kiosks. There will be a need for an actual employee to load the raw ingredients into the input hoppers from the delivery trucks and someone to haul out the trash and swab the floors at the end of the day.
Coffee shops will probably be the first to go that route. 99.9% of coffee shops already have 100% automated espresso makers that require no more than punching in the number of shots and pushing the “START” button, not too much more difficult to operate than the self-serve soda-pop machines all fast food outfits already have.
My prediction is that in short order the espresso makers will be moved from behind the counter to the FRONT of the counter where customers make their own espresso drinks, completely eliminating the need for a “barista” to push the “START” button for you.
It’s only one more step for the espresso machine makers to add a credit-card swipe unit that auto-charges you for the espresso you make based on the number of shots you dial in.
At that point, the only need for an employee is to load the beans in the hoppers. Big enough hoppers, and that need be done only once a day. At that point, many of these shops can then just be converted into totally self-serve kiosks.
Once this equipment gets built, installed and self-serve shown to be successful, the rest of the country will quickly move in that same direction.
Six decades ago, before the proliferation of these fast food restaurants, we had far fewer disgustingly obese Americans. The grandparents and great-grandparents of these porkers had much better sense when it came to nutrition and the need for physical exercise.
Why would people eat the garbage that these fast food places produce? Is it just ignorance, or are they perhaps addicted?
It's sad.