Wendy's to install robotic kiosks across 6,000 restaurants

originally posted by: lavatrance
I'd rather use a kiosk by far. For example. I go to a pita place today and I was very bothered by the service. They failed to put any spices on the puta. They seemed almost bothered by me asking to have everything on it. Etc etc. Like what gives. Id way rather use a kiosk than deal with a minimum wage workers who hates there job. At other stores I always use the self checkout. It's way easier often times.

A kiosk isn't going to prepare and bring your food for you.

a reply to: MysticPearl

Wow... couldnt have said it better myself!

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: pl3bscheese

Re-education camps are soon to be.

How can you re-educate people that have not been educated to begin with. Maybe instead of studying art, "insert minority" studies, underwater basket weaving or any of the other classes, they should have learned a skill that is marketable.

The issue is we push "collage" way to much now. Liberal arts degrees are great for knowledge, for the most part useless for getting a job. I have a BA and a MA and they have been helpful to move up in my job, but just because it shows that i'm trainable and willing to learn. I don't work in anything related to my degree.

Increased automaton, basic income.

Problem solved.

originally posted by: DBCowboy
a reply to: xuenchen

If I were young, I'd be training to be a kiosk-robot-technician.

By its very nature, automation reduces the need for human labour.

If a machine replaces 100 people, it won't need 100 people to service and maintain it. It will need less than that.

Which means you'd damn well be the one fine kiosk-robot-technician.

However, they will eventually come up with a machine to service that machine. And possibly service itself as well. And if they can do that, what possible need could they have for any employee?

And if everyone is automating, which they are, who will buy the products and services?

With what money?

originally posted by: Fishy
By its very nature, automation reduces the need for human labour.

I'm reminded of a joke, Automating can be broken up into it's root words, auto meaning self and mating meaning screwing. Successful automation can reduce labor but a lot of times the process of automating something isn't implemented efficiently, requires a lot of oversight, and adds more time than it solves. That's not the case with large scale automation such as these kiosks but any engineer at a small scale company can attest to automation in many times resulting in needing more time to solve the problem.

Let me give an example from my field. 3d motion capture has been catching on pretty heavily over the past decade, it's now to the point where you can buy a mocap system for $350. These systems are good enough to do a large portion of animation for you, but tend to require several takes, and then there's always touch up work at the end. In the end, a small animation job takes just as long now to use mocap as it used to take with traditional keyframes. The only thing that has changed is where you're spending the majority of your time.

XKCD has an interesting chart on the concept of automation and how much time automating a task needs to take in order for you to actually save time doing it.

xkcd.com...

If a machine replaces 100 people, it won't need 100 people to service and maintain it. It will need less than that.

These kiosks don't replace 100 people though. If 1 kiosk does the job of 2 people, and the fast food restaurant is open 24 hours, it replaces 6 people (2 for each shift) and more realistically 4 people because you're not running at 100% capacity during all shifts. So we lose 4 jobs but we gain 2 in people putting together more orders (either cooking or bagging) because you now have more volume and then we probably gain an average of 1 job in support (technicians, development, management, etc) so overall 1 job is lost per kiosk but productivity increases.

And if everyone is automating, which they are, who will buy the products and services?

With what money?

It will require a new economic system. Ever watch 50's and 60's sci fi? They came up with all these wondrous machines that do everything for everyone and depict each person living a life of leisure. They never asked the question though about how everyone pays for that.

Lots of times futurists like to talk about a post scarcity economy, I would argue we're already there, but the scarcity isn't in resources but in labor. How do you handle a society where more labor is available than is needed? The only answer I can come up with to this, is that the work day needs to be shortened in order to spread the existing labor around. This leads to issues though where no one earns enough income. This then leads me to the conclusion that we need a consumption based system rather than a production based one.

a reply to: Aazadan

I think you are underestimating how many people work cashiers and the sophistication of the kiosks..

At least a third of every staff is cashiers in one form or the other. That includes every cashier, server and countless other positions..pretty much taking the place of every service industry job.

And that's just the VERY, VERY immediate future and with technology that is less advanced than your cell phone.


When automation decimated the American manufacturing, we created the service industry to replace it. Sure, the jobs paid less, but at least they were jobs...

Where does our economy go next?

And that's just today, how long till their are robots that work the grill, killing all the line cook jobs? (If I'm right they already have prototypes).

There already are not enough careers for all the people with a good work ethic, what happens when there isn't enough jobs period?

How does an economy survive with no consumer class to power it??..or at least a consumer class that is only a fraction of the population?

The kiosks are not the end result, they are the begining of the cliff.

a reply to: Aazadan

The only truly plausible thing I can think of is state allowances, then you work for any extra.

I don't think you can completely remove work, because you need innovation, and capitalism has provided loads of that.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
I think you are underestimating how many people work cashiers and the sophistication of the kiosks..

I'm not under estimating it at all. I just don't see it as an issue. It will eliminate 1 in 4ish jobs from using your numbers 33% of positions. That's an overall reduction in employment by about 8%. I just see it as another reason to shorten the work week.

The end goal is to get to the point where we work very little, instead perhaps we'll all own machines that do the labor. I don't want to speculate too much here on alternative economic systems but if everyone were able to monetize their consumption habits, and then leverage that into buying assets (robots) that produce more goods we would probably be able to make a system where people could be self supporting without the taxation issues of a basic income.

And that's just today, how long till their are robots that work the grill, killing all the line cook jobs? (If I'm right they already have prototypes).

They do, they also have robot waiters, and Asia is working on robotic shelf stockers. Give it 30 years and I bet 90% of low end jobs will be automated.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
a reply to: Aazadan

The only truly plausible thing I can think of is state allowances, then you work for any extra.

I don't think you can completely remove work, because you need innovation, and capitalism has provided loads of that.

I guess I will go into my idea briefly, I've recently come up with a new addition to the idea:
#1. We introduce a second currency to be used alongside regular dollars. This second currency is digital only and is monitored to always maintain the same amount per capita in the population. We do not allow a banking system for this second currency.
#2. Taxes are collected on both dollars and the new currency ensuring stores need to collect it. We manage this using some degree of price fixing (not entirely sure on the details yet).
#3. Whenever a purchase is made with the digital currency (which would be on non essential items, or items the government wants to increase the purchase of), the owner loses that amount in their account, and it's divided among every other person in the US. So if someone spent 317 million on something each person would get 1 back.
#4. An exchange would be set up to let people buy the new currency with dollars, or sell dollars for the new currency using bank transfers.

What this would do, is give each person in the US a basic income through economic activity without actually taxing anything. Simply existing would create a form of income that could be used to purchase food and shelter. As a form of recurring income it also allows for lines of credit in dollars (selling the second currency to bring in dollars). Using these credit lines which everyone would then have access to, everyone would have the collateral to purchase their own robots (or come together to invest in an automation business) which creates robots to do labor. This would in turn provide more purchasing power and more demand for products.

The neat part about this is that as dollar income rises from this, the demand for the digital currency rises, which increases the value of the basic income, and in turn ensures that if the wealthy are doing well the poor have a more valuable asset to sell which can then get them nicer housing, more/better food, and so on.

miss post

originally posted by: Aazadan
These kiosks don't replace 100 people though. If 1 kiosk does the job of 2 people, and the fast food restaurant is open 24 hours, it replaces 6 people (2 for each shift) and more realistically 4 people because you're not running at 100% capacity during all shifts. So we lose 4 jobs but we gain 2 in people putting together more orders (either cooking or bagging) because you now have more volume and then we probably gain an average of 1 job in support (technicians, development, management, etc) so overall 1 job is lost per kiosk but productivity increases.

It doesn't matter how many people the burger machine replaces. That wasn't the point. And the example I gave was purely hypothetical. The point is that automation *always* makes more people redundant than it creates jobs for. At least relative to productivity. That's the purpose of automation. If automation created just as many jobs, paid the same as the ones it makes redundant, it would defeat the purpose of automation. That's simple praxeology.

If you want an actual example of a single machine actually replacing hundreds if not thousands of people then look at the mining industry and agriculture. So your objection is nitpicking.

And the point wasn't about productivity increasing. Which by itself implies than more than just the 6 people lose their livelihoods (since the machine has greater productivity than 6 people it can actually replace more people for the same production volume).

I'm not sure where you get the extra jobs from that mitigate the impact on the requirement for human labour. A machine that can make burgers can't also bag them or can't be augmented by a machine that bags them as well? And a touchscreen machine for presenting the menu and taking the order and a POS for taking payment?

originally posted by: Aazadan

It will require a new economic system. Ever watch 50's and 60's sci fi? They came up with all these wondrous machines that do everything for everyone and depict each person living a life of leisure. They never asked the question though about how everyone pays for that.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. I would ask you why should anyone pay anything at all in the first place. Money is created out of nothing at a geometrically increasing rate anyway.

I would completely agree with you that we need a new socio-economic system and soon. I personally would suggest an RBE or technocracy.

originally posted by: Aazadan Lots of times futurists like to talk about a post scarcity economy, I would argue we're already there, but the scarcity isn't in resources but in labor. How do you handle a society where more labor is available than is needed? The only answer I can come up with to this, is that the work day needs to be shortened in order to spread the existing labor around. This leads to issues though where no one earns enough income. This then leads me to the conclusion that we need a consumption based system rather than a production based one.

What do you mean by a consumption based system?

The solution would be simple. Do away with money and private ownership of means of production. Or at least institute a basic income for every adult citizen.

originally posted by: Fishy
It doesn't matter how many people the burger machine replaces. That wasn't the point. And the example I gave was purely hypothetical. The point is that automation *always* makes more people redundant than it creates jobs for. At least relative to productivity. That's the purpose of automation. If automation created just as many jobs, paid the same as the ones it makes redundant, it would defeat the purpose of automation. That's simple praxeology.

It does matter how many jobs are replaced, because the argument is that these kiosks are being brought in, in order to punish people for demanding a higher wage. There are only a finite number of jobs in these companies, so the argument of punishment rests on the idea that the company is cutting down on the numbers of these jobs. if they aren't substantially doing so because a nearly equal number of equivalent paying jobs are being created, then it can't be in response to the wage issue.

They are instead going with the kiosks because it increases sales volume.

I would completely agree with you that we need a new socio-economic system and soon. I personally would suggest an RBE or technocracy.

Such a system is only possible post resource scarcity. We need something to transition to that point.

What do you mean by a consumption based system?

The solution would be simple. Do away with money and private ownership of means of production. Or at least institute a basic income for every adult citizen.

Just as I wrote out, the drive behind currency is based on societies desire to consume rather than produce. Consumption generates currency which in turn can drive a basic income as all people have to consume at a minimum food and shelter. A persons basic need for those things creates jobs in the economy and that's a commodity they should be able to monetize.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
I think you are underestimating how many people work cashiers and the sophistication of the kiosks..

I'm not under estimating it at all. I just don't see it as an issue. It will eliminate 1 in 4ish jobs from using your numbers 33% of positions. That's an overall reduction in employment by about 8%. I just see it as another reason to shorten the work week.

The end goal is to get to the point where we work very little, instead perhaps we'll all own machines that do the labor. I don't want to speculate too much here on alternative economic systems but if everyone were able to monetize their consumption habits, and then leverage that into buying assets (robots) that produce more goods we would probably be able to make a system where people could be self supporting without the taxation issues of a basic income.

And that's just today, how long till their are robots that work the grill, killing all the line cook jobs? (If I'm right they already have prototypes).

They do, they also have robot waiters, and Asia is working on robotic shelf stockers. Give it 30 years and I bet 90% of low end jobs will be automated.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
a reply to: Aazadan

The only truly plausible thing I can think of is state allowances, then you work for any extra.

I don't think you can completely remove work, because you need innovation, and capitalism has provided loads of that.

I guess I will go into my idea briefly, I've recently come up with a new addition to the idea:
#1. We introduce a second currency to be used alongside regular dollars. This second currency is digital only and is monitored to always maintain the same amount per capita in the population. We do not allow a banking system for this second currency.
#2. Taxes are collected on both dollars and the new currency ensuring stores need to collect it. We manage this using some degree of price fixing (not entirely sure on the details yet).
#3. Whenever a purchase is made with the digital currency (which would be on non essential items, or items the government wants to increase the purchase of), the owner loses that amount in their account, and it's divided among every other person in the US. So if someone spent 317 million on something each person would get 1 back.
#4. An exchange would be set up to let people buy the new currency with dollars, or sell dollars for the new currency using bank transfers.

What this would do, is give each person in the US a basic income through economic activity without actually taxing anything. Simply existing would create a form of income that could be used to purchase food and shelter. As a form of recurring income it also allows for lines of credit in dollars (selling the second currency to bring in dollars). Using these credit lines which everyone would then have access to, everyone would have the collateral to purchase their own robots (or come together to invest in an automation business) which creates robots to do labor. This would in turn provide more purchasing power and more demand for products.

The neat part about this is that as dollar income rises from this, the demand for the digital currency rises, which increases the value of the basic income, and in turn ensures that if the wealthy are doing well the poor have a more valuable asset to sell which can then get them nicer housing, more/better food, and so on.

Seems unnecessarily complicated, but I like the income inequality measure.

I just think an allowance system is easy..no currency swap, your taking care of all the "useless people" in one fail swoop. You have your saftey net and consumer class with money..and most importantly it is being battle tested as we speak.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
Seems unnecessarily complicated, but I like the income inequality measure.

I just think an allowance system is easy..no currency swap, your taking care of all the "useless people" in one fail swoop. You have your saftey net and consumer class with money..and most importantly it is being battle tested as we speak.

It sounds complicated but in practice it's pretty simple, people do similar things all the time already and you can even tie it all into the same debit card swipe at a register.

There should be no one on this planet living below what is middle class for their family size with price control so that house payments (no one should be renting, not single stay at home moms, not disabled, not out of work, not elderly, all at good incomes and all in their own homes, because they co-own the entire planet equally and all its resources and they're incredibly fed up iwth the ugly demonic mean asshat ideologies of slavers and even the good little slaves who have sold out everyone else), so that those payments to own their lovely and beautiful ample sized estates with utilities are not more than 1/4 income and food no GMO, organic.

Plus release the clean energy.

Anything else is beyond criminal but also has huge consequences for the slavers. The IOU's to anyone abused by anyone else, or impoverished or treated as sub human, is huge. Once the tests are over, we haul you before the councils where you answer to us.

It is a gift, not a right, there is no entitlement, for the slavers to create businesses and monopolies that earn them good salaries and homes, while they expect you to work for them and not eat after your rent, or get your dental, or any dream you have.

You don't have to work for anyone, you have full entitlement to the land and resources, to have your friends and family erect your home and help you plant your garden, and anyone asking for your assistance had better have some incredible perks and ensure you will also have good home, good gardens, good food, and good benefits and extra's because you are EQUAL TO THEM AND THEY DON'T OWN YOU.

THESE ARE THE ABC'S AND 123'S OF LIFE THAT I WAS BORN KNOWING, SO WAKE UP PLEASE BECAUSE OTHERWISE YOU ARE CO-RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT OTHERS GO THROUGH IF YOU'RE BLOCKING THEIR RIGHT TO LIVE AND EXIST FREELY. YOU ANSWER FOR IT.

a reply to: Unity_99

There's a right way to do that and a wrong way to do that. The right way is to maintain private ownership over the means of production and implement some form of recurring income that lets people invest in machines that produce more goods. The wrong way is to step towards communism and remove rewards for working harder.

One thing I've thought about from time to time, is what if we had a state owned supply of robots to produce goods. The profit from those goods was collected and distributed to the needy. With the poor essentially buying shares of the labor pool that would pay back dividends. The problem I come up with here is that I don't like the idea of government run business because the private sector can't really compete, how can someone who needs to earn a profit compete with someone who can always run at a loss and subsidize themselves with taxes?

I think there's something to the idea and that it can work, I'm just not quite sure how.

Also, when everyone is middle class, people simply view middle class as the new poor. There is always going to be a bottom 10% of society, and there has to be a bottom 10% of society. Making sure they meet the first few levels of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs seems like the responsible thing to do however.

a reply to: Aazadan

And as long as half of the people are below average, there's not really a lot we can do to change their lot in life. I hate to sound like a social Darwinian, but half of the people will always be behind the bell curve.

The bottom 20% always get labeled as "poor", no matter what they do. A quintile is like that.

a reply to: redempsh

There's always going to be a bottom 1/5/10/20/99%. Ensuring that people at the bottom are meeting lifes basic needs isn't impossible though.

a reply to: TechniXcality

I agree tech jobs would increase big time with automation. Engineering,CS degrees would get even more valuable.

This is a weapon of mass equality. This will end 3rd world slave labor once and for all.