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.
There not paying those people enough to even pay for basic things like rent, food, gas, utilities etc...Forget car payments, medical or buying homes etc...
So what's the big deal?
You won’t have to wait until 2025 for an automated fast-food joint. The systems exist now, and fast food recipes are so exacting that they lend themselves very readily to that kind of automation. All it’s going to take is a slight nudge in the direction of automation desirability and it’ll be widespread in no time. The fast food worker cadre won’t believe how quickly they get replaced. No doubt there will be a huge outcry over it, but it’ll all come down to operating efficiency. The restaurants will be able to show better performance, and one more low-skill type of work will vanish.
There were automated diners in the ‘40’s. But labor was so cheap they couldn’t make it. It’s not so much the direct cost of labor that makes hiring people unattractive, it’s the 45-50% adder cost and the unbounded liability that kills hiring. When you add in unemployment insurance, mandated “benefits” (socialism in the workplace dictated by government) and insurance, mandated paperwork, local taxes, etc. Then, you add on the fact that Congress has put laws on the books allowing your special protected class of workers (blacks) to sue you for imagined discrimination with the taxpayer footing their legal bill...you have the perfect storm to destroy the labor market.
All of the nation’s current economic problems and unemployment are government induced. It’s not just one thing, it’s an entire meddlesome government mentality that would have to change. But, instead of backing away they will meddle even harder.
One enterprising chap has invented the hamburger flipping robot, a vending machine that makes hamburgers. Darned good ones too by all reports, complete with bleu cheese or other options.
Of course people concerned about all our jobs going to China will cry, just as French weavers would throw their wooden shoes (sabots) into the automatic weaving machines which were so much more efficient that they would surely put the lower classes out of work and make them starve.
There are already some automated fast food outlets out there, others have a kiosk to choose instead of the human cashier.
Buccee’s already has computer screens where you enter your order in some locations.
Your point begs the question, what happens when a computer/robot can do your job cheaper and more efficiently than you can? Let’s say a computer can fly an airplane better, perform a surgery better, create sturdier and more beautiful buildings, plumb a house, or fix a robot. What are humans for?