Posted on 03/01/2020 12:16:21 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
In the 1960s, Milton Friedman reportedly visited a construction site in a foreign country. To his surprise, the canal builders used no heavy machinery and instead armed thousands of men with shovels. He questioned the bureaucrat about this odd choice and the bureaucrat responded that it was a jobs program. “Oh, I thought you were trying to build a canal,” Friedman said. “If it’s jobs you want, then you should give these workers spoons, not shovels.”
Friedman’s absurd proposal illustrates the absurdity of make-work bias—the belief that conserving labor makes us poorer. Make-work bias was particularly popular during the Industrial Revolution, when legions of new machines upended the old way of doing things. No one was more famously upset than the textile workers of the early 19th century—Luddites—who railed against the automatic loom, the “job-killing” machines of their day.
Modern Day Luddites
We in the Information Age have our own Luddites. Among their ranks are Las Vegas culinary workers trying to hold back AI servers and bartenders and teamsters opposing self-driving vehicles and delivery robots. Luddites and their sympathizers heap a particularly large amount of criticism on self-checkouts, probably because their ubiquity makes them an obvious target.
Their apprehension is understandable. The proliferation of self-checkouts touches our daily lives so completely that it’s hard to imagine cashiers not losing their jobs or suffering smaller paychecks. Self-checkouts threaten cashiers as surely as excavators threatened shovel manufacturers. It is no surprise that protests erupted after a French supermarket used self-checkouts to get around labor laws or that the Oregon AFL-CIO backed a petition which limits the number of self-checkouts to two per store. Every supplier hates competition.
(Excerpt) Read more at fee.org ...
No offense, but remaining in NJ is inherently kinda stupid to start with. :P
Imagine what will happen to NJ drivers in an emergency when there are no attendants available but the pumps are on. Whole bunch of people who don’t know how to refuel their vehicles and die as a result. :P
Offer a discount for using the self checkout and charge a premium for an attended lane.
Problem solved.
Next.
The war on retail service shows the author’s bias. Self-checkout should be of benefit to the consumer, and not only the store.
“We choose to use a self-checkout. We know many people prefer them because companies keep installing them”
Horse Hockey
Self-checkouts are installed because they are cheaper. We don’t yet “prefer” them.
Like ATM’s, Self Checkout is great for much, but awful for some transactions.
Have two checks, endorsed over to you? Mutilated currency? need specific currency denominations like $100 or $5 ATM can’t help.
Self checkout with manually packaged specials from the meat department, wrinkled barcodes, no codes on those apples? It ain’t heppening.
My favorite store, ALDI, has everything pre-packaged and coded, no weighing things, so it’s eezy peezy for the checkers. One step away from self-checkout.
But there are still issues that come up.
Self checkout is great, until it isn’t.
I don’t like self-checkout and don’t use it. The Aldi model is much better in my opinion. They have the fastest scanning checkout clerks I’ve ever seen, then they just put the items in the cart and the customer bags their own purchases.
The times I’ve been to an Aldi’s, I’d take my purchases to my car and then take them out of the cart and bag them or place them in the trunk. The best check out process I’ve experienced.
The door check *long* precedes self-checkout. They were doing that when I moved to Texas in 1995.
I agree. I want service.
I’m ok with self check out for 3-4 items. I hate it with a full grocery cart.
I truly despise fast food self serve. I had to use one at Taco Bell recently then had to go to the counter to pay in cash. How utterly stupid.
My sentiments exactly. I’ve made that comment on a post-shopping store survey: if I wanted to work there, I would apply.
I don’t care if other people prefer self-checkout. That’s their right. I’m not saying that stores should do away with self-checkout. I just don’t want to be forced to use them.
If I’m just running in for a loaf of bread, no problem. But, like you, if I have a cart full, and it includes things like a 15-lb box of dog biscuits, a 24-pack of sodas, and several different bags of produce, I don’t want to do all the work of scanning and bagging them. I got in just that situation once. Not one single lane open with a cashier. Fortunately, the cashier in charge of the self-checkout lanes took pity on me and basically checked my groceries.
Not really that many restaurants are flipping burgers 24/7.
For grocery shopping at our Safeway, I won’t use the self-checkout if I have fruits and vegetables. You have to look up those items on the computer screen menu, and that’s a pain. Especially when “green onions” are listed under G and not O, or maybe the other way around. They should list them in BOTH places. :)
I don’t care how long I have to wait. I will NOT be an unpaid employee and do self-checkout.
3. Getting stuck behind someone who insists on paying in pennies.
And the people who d*** around with checks or coins always wait until the total is announced to reach for them - like they didn't expect to have to pay at all.
“I wish someone would still pump gas and clean windshields.”
They have that.
They’re called teenagers.
I have a couple I bring along in the car for just such service.
They do a good job and NO TIP is required.
FWIW - Believe it or not, You can’t pump your own gas in New Jersey.
What stores do that - and where? That's poor customer service, and I speak as one who generally prefers self-check.
Some ATMs can dispense more than just $20s though that is uncommon.
My bank’s ATMs accept checks and will cheerfully process checks endorsed over to me. Mutilated currency is stored for camera review by remote.
Self checkout with those manually packaged specials? Generally works fine with the later generations of scanners. Apples are looked up by the user in an index and while annoying are not an impossibility.
Aldi also does sell fruits and veggies that aren’t prepackaged and coded. They just don’t sell as much of it.
Yup, they wait and wait and wait and wait until the cashier reads off the total, never mind that the total has been displayed on a 20” display right in front of them the entire time.
Ever been to NJ? I was born and raised near Boston, and married into NJ. I live in a town with gas lamps and love it here. People who have never been beyond the turnpike have no idea of the differences in the state.
The rest of us do not want to wait behind you.
I hate self checkouts, I like to socialise with people.
Same thing in the isles, I’m the guy who just starts talking with you while your trying to pick out some pork chops.
the same place the elevator operator and doorman went, the welfare line.
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