.jpg)
Its all part of the plan, get as many people unemployed as possible
I would say this...by 2016...minimum wage will have gone up another $1 (it’s a logical expectation that both political parties will visit to garner votes for that election). Sometime around 2025...I expect McDonalds to shock the public by developing and marketing the ‘automated shop’.
You will walk into a McDonalds and face a screen....hitting the buttons to note what you want, and then swipe your credit card. The bulk of the restaurant will be automated with robot features, and probably feature one manager and two clerks (merely to reload the systems or handle break-downs). It’ll be a staged event with five or six nationally placed for view.
By 2030...half of the McDonalds in America will be on this automated system, and tens of thousands of employees will be released to the public sector...unable to find any real employment.
Burger King, Pizza Hut, and the rest will follow. I expect 2040 to arrive with massive unemployment throughout the US, and economic experts at a loss to explain how automated system arrived, and their relationship to the minimum wage. The dopes will sit there and grin during televised interviews.
Anger and hostility will brew against the developers of automated systems and robots. Occupy Wall Street will turn into Occupy Automation. People will shake their heads over the strange turn of events.
Minimum wage jobs are entry level, low skilled jobs. They aren't supposed to support a family. Anyone who starts as a burger flipper knows if they want to stay with a franchise, then management is were they need to go if they have ability.
If minimum wage jobs are so crucial to survival, then why not dictate a $20 per hour or $40 per hour or $100 per hour minimum wage? At some point, even a brain dead liberal will say, “how can a business pay this amount?” That is exactly the point. If the minimum wage is artificially raised by fiat, then to to stay in business — sell a product that customers can afford — the owner will have to cut costs. Invariably, the highest cost for an owner is LABOR. The owner will either cut staff or look to automation as a substitute for manual work.
The technology already exists to automate the ordering, preparation, and delivery of product at MCDonald’s [or other franchise]. For the franchise owner, automating replaces his labor headaches. Machines don't get sick, take time off, come in late, argue over shifts, or have other other human problems. All the machines need is periodic maintenance and adjustment.
The SEIU, as an example, is really big on “living” minimum wages for its members. What are these workers going to do if their boss says he's automating and eliminating their job position? SEIU members aren't skilled workers and there's fewer and fewer jobs they can do. Pursuing this “minimum living wage” myth will have negative consequences for the “do gooder” politicians pushing this idea. Low skilled workers will go away and union members will also suffer as increasing minimum wage rates cause blowback in the employment market.
“Medieval doctors bled their patients with leeches. Far from improving their condition, it left them worse off.”
Leeches are starting to be used again in modern medicine.
I did a little googling and found this:
http://www.leechestherapy.com/history_of_leeches.php
“Recently, however, leeches have once again found their place in the field of medicine. They are now being bred in captivity in several institutions and leech farms are once again being created, but the use of leeches has become quite sophisticated. They’re not just used for anything, they are also used in the field of microsurgery and to release or drain the congested blood in some wound sites and are preferred in this area because of their precision. Plastic surgeons also use leeches to treat challenging skin grafts and most especially for reconstructive surgery.”
Before the recession, the total number of manufacturing employees in the USA peaked around June 2008.
Five years later, employees are down 13%, but the value of the goods they produced is only down 2%.
I think the next group of workers to get slaughtered will be interstate truckers who drive warehouse-to-warehouse.
I bet by 2020 we'll have robot expressway trucks, and if their loads are palletized, we'll have robot loaders and unloaders, too.
Great points and true.
Like most of the grocery stores here in Maryland that have automated checkers as does does Home Depot. I love those.
Ironically Walmarts stopping doing automated because of the low quantity of customers they attract (Obama voters) and the low quality of employees they hire, meaning theft.
At least that is what is going on here.
It breaks the cult paradigm. I am not waiting on line at walmart for some group of losers to move.
I actually would prefer to have my BigMac made by a BurgerBot.
This is EXACTLY what I predicted.The only(employees)left will be”food-prep)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The smart chains are already on this. The threats from the government are quite sufficient to inspire them.
Intriguing how he clearly ignored the fact that the latest minimum wage increase very quickly raised the unemployment rate from ~5% to ~10%.
A big mac costs 3.99, would raising the price 25% to 4.99 really drive away business?
Robots don’t need health insurance. They just need a good tech.