by A.F. Branco at constitution.com
For the last few years we have seen minimum wage workers on the streets protesting and going on strike to have their wage increased by law.
"What do we want? 15! If we don't get it? Shut it down!" chanted the protesters at dawn, bathed in neon light from the restaurant and Times Square billboards.
This mindset is a bit of a problem.
You see, your wage is set by things like your personal skill-set and market demand for the position you occupy.
If you have skills that allow you to occupy a position which is in demand in the marketplace, you are going to get paid more. If you don't have such a skill-set and occupy a position that is not in demand, you're not going to get paid much at all.
So, what happens when you demand more money than your skill-set or position is worth?
McDonald's shares hit an all-time high on Tuesday as Wall Street expects sales to increase from new digital ordering kiosks that will replace cashiers in 2,500 restaurants.
Cowen raised its rating on McDonald's shares to outperform from market perform because of the technology upgrades, which are slated for the fast-food chain's restaurants this year.
Automation and technology takes over obsolete jobs
Slavery was abolished in the US because the practice is immoral.
It doesn't matter that plantation owners complained that they wouldn't be able to get all of their cotton picked. They simply had to deal with the reality and use technology and automation (the cotton Gin) to fill in the gap.
It is my belief that in 50 years we will look at McDonald cashier positions the same way that we look at cotton picking plantations from 100 years ago: they were archaic remnants of an immoral society.
Hopefully, we can figure out the user-generated-token economy, like Steemit and the many other similar platforms that will be developed using blockchain technology, and nobody will have to be a wage-slave.
My vote is for humanity!
:D
Well said but again value depends greatly on the living standards you know, for example I've been to Switzerland where average pay is 5000$ and then I get back to Balkan where average pay is 300$. Do you notice a difference? And yes things are a bit more expensive in Switzerland but again there having an iPhone 7 or Samsung Galaxy S8 is like a most normal thing ever and here you have to be pretty rich to allow yourself to spend 800$ on a phone. The thing is that I earned 170$ on steemit for 2 weeks I've been here and tht is someones pay for a month of hard work here, but for example that kind of money is unimportant for someone in Switzerland.
This is a very good perspective.. different countries.. different cost of living. Although i think $15 dollars minimum wage is crazy.. i do beilive a small increase is due. Maybe $8 dollar minimum wage increase? In the state that i live the minimum is $7.25 .. 75 cents would be huge! Most people that i know living in the U.S know that cost of living has increased but pay has stayed around the same! My economics teacher once told my class that it was possible to work a sumer job and be able to afford college wihtout having loans or borrowing money ( when she was in college) . Unlike many other students i know im lucky to have a decent paying job.
Yes exactly, every country has different living standarts !
a wake up call like this is needed for most jobs. Everyone has this sense of entitlement that they're owed something or they're worth a certain amount (wage) . You're worth what the market is willing to pay for your services... and if you're willing to settle for a skill-less job.. tic toc, tic toc, you're number will be up sooner than you think.
don't worry about new jobs - platforms like Steem will be a huge source of freelancer Jobs now & in the future.
With each year there are more & more creative ways for people to earn money without the need for a 9 - 17 job.
People should be rewarded constantly for every positive thing that they do :))
"Money" itself may become obsolete by 2020. ;)
Maybe sooner...
Well said. The problem is exactly what you said - an entitlement to "I deserve x amount of dollars and x amount of vacation time and freedom to create my own work schedule". However, these people fail to consider their consequences when reality is, employees are already very expensive. Right from the beginning a company loses money training an employee for given job. During and after training, the employer has to pay their share of the employees part of social security, they have to pay workmans comp, unemployment, as well as that hourly wage or salary. Remember, a person doesn't open a business so you live can live comfortably - they open it so they can live comfortably and you as the employee are there to assist in a (hopefully) smooth operation.
Now lets look at a kiosk. Lets say a kiosk costs $8-10,000 each. So that's a big upfront expense plus maintenance and subscription for repair etc. See where this is going? In a few months, the kiosk has already paid for itself and the employer isn't paying into workmans comp, unemployment, social security etc. The only concern is potential kiosk down time which will only cost a few hundred per month rather than a few thousand per month.
best of all, robot's don't check their txt messages & social media during work hours :)
Having given up fast food places years ago unless there is no other choice, I'd actually prefer they close... Food is unhealthy, horridly expensive for what you get, and the eco effect from the disposable table ware, transportation, and water usage is huge... Not the choices I make!
Many many jobs will be taken by robots even without minimum wage restrictions. Bolckchain is a great technology but I don't think it can do much about it. The politicians are the first ones responsible to find solutions for such a crisis but for the moment they are too busy to fight the 'blockchain tax evasion'...
yes you're right bro nobody care.
The other day while I was getting gas for my car, I pondered this minimum wage thing. I didn't think about it too long, because the car hops had finished filling my tank, checking my oil, cleaning my windshield and topping off my tires. I reached out the window and paid my bill and drove home to my building. I started to bring up the discussion with the doorman, but he just laughed and let me know that the night milk delivery had come and he would have the bellhop take it up to my apartment. Before getting on the elevator, I let Joe the lift operator know that I was going to get my shoe shined, which became an opportune moment, since the paper boy had just delivered the evening news. The front page article was about a local operation having a hard time finding workers and offered to train them as an apprenticeship. I didn't think much of it and decided check out the wanted ads to see if I could hire someone to wax my handcrafted boat.
100% upvoted this.
Amazing reply.
I'm glad you got it. I'm sure there are plenty of people too young to understand the references.
Bring on the robots! I'm sick of them always messing up my order! How many times have I had to send you back? haha plus I trust a robot more when it comes to handling my food.
Corporative greed going moon it seems. Robots are cheaper, possibly convenient than humans in some operations but imagine a world where all corporations are using this freaking tech. Large population will be out of job. We might see another anti-tech revolution just like Ned Lud strike in Britain couple of centuries ago.
It's a good way of showing how dysfunctional modern democracies can be. A lot of people on minimum wage vote for a higher wage, while not being equipped with the knowledge that this only hurts them. Sure, in the short and medium term they will earn a little bit more.
Over the long run most og us will be displaced by some form of automation anyways. It's a tectonic shift in our society and it's going to be interesting to see where this goes!
Good post, good subject
In my life I have witnessed the birth of the internet, the birth and death of bbs's, the various surges of tabletop gaming, more wars than I'm allowed to know about, and the birth of crypto. These are exciting times. They are what the old proverb calls "interesting times". There's a reason that's a curse, failure to adapt quickly to the new environment leads to death.
People calling for the raising of minimum wage are operating with tools from before my birth. They are failing to adapt.
I think this will occur in a lot of position were the task is easily automated. In the end it may actually cause less errors to happen as well. Human error happens and it occurs more often because the people working a lot of entry level jobs are unsatisfied with there working environment and don't try nearly as hard. This isn't true of everybody, as I've known people who have worked at fast food restaurant that were better workers then I've seen in corporate jobs also. As technology becomes more and more advanced humans skill sets will
Skill set and market demand have little to do with wages, especially in the context of the last 20-50 years. Automation will replace workers making $7.25 or less and it will replace a significant amount of construction workers, administrators, and others whose skill sets are considered more advanced.
Minimum wages are an admittedly far less effective solution than Employee Stock Option Plans or DAO's but the general public is also far more aware of them. Perhaps working to educate workers facing displacement regarding the opportunities in decentralization would be more helpful than blaming them for fighting for better wages.
Labor is a commodity just list anything, if you use price controls it only hurts the use of that commodity.
They have already built some McDonald's with no windows and just kiosks and a drive through, times are changing fast! Great post!
I think you are right.
Even if jobs get lost there will come new ones which we cant imagine now.
Take your time machine and travel back a couple of years and tell people others will make fortunes with lets play channels or tutorials on whatever for example.
Nothing have an objective value. It is the market (ourselves) that give the value of things through the process of supply and demand.
Informative great post.
Great article , but sometimes we have to be more persistent , if we really do great job nothing can replace us .. Robots replace only not that usefull workers ..
So everythink depends on us ..
Well Said. I think in the near future robots will be serving us in McDonalds , Kfc, burger king etc. I wonder how much the machines will be earning ? hehe
Think further into the future.
You order food with an app, the food is prepared by robots, and delivered to you by drone. This method would actually be leaps and bounds more effective, convenient, and cheaper.
Costs would be waaaaay down because you wouldn't' have to deal with staff, order accuracy would be nearly 100% (besides the occasional glitch), and you wouldn't have to create convenient locations because everything is distributed from a central regional location.
Great job sir!
Upvoted!
May I please resteem it ?
Crazy Bernie avoided, congratz americans!
This is an entry level job with absolutely 0 benefits to society. For example, sitting on your butt and driving cargo across the state is NOT productive. Humans are not meant to do these things. We're meant to innovate, discover, and grow. Being in those jobs (no matter the age) needs to go out the window. Automation is disruptive, but necessary. It will sting in the beginning. However, in the long run we're all going to love it.
As for the minimum wage garbage. You're worth what you get paid for. As soon as you let government interfere, you kill industry.
This has already happened in MANY countries around the world. In germany we already have a few mcdonalds that are nearly ALL machines, there is one not far from me that has 8 machines that you order from, you receive a ticket and then stand in line as ONE employee hands them to you.
Im not sure what people assumed would happen when they asked for higher wages for doing a menial job, but, i guess at the end of it all, this is the outcome.
This will of course only accelerate as more people demand higher wages and machines are easier to build and to purchase
Very informative and well done blog. Had me engaged and normally my mind starts to wander off in boredom.
I actually feel bad for the workers whose jobs are going to become obsolete. I've gone to that Mc Donald's in Times Square, it's always packed and seems like hell to work for a meager salary. But its all about the greedy investors nowadays.
Well said . If the job is easy and can be done by most people , I don't see why should they be paid 15$ minimum wage an hour . BUT IF LETS Say a father of 2 is working inmacdonals as it is hard to find a job , the government should step on and provide mean tested benefits such as food coupons etc . Such minimum wage level will only encourage the younger generation to drop out from college ( imo) if they see slight wage difference compared to most of the white collared labour jobs .
The worth of money is different in many countries if you give 15 dollars to a indian worker or pakistani worker he will be delighted but where as in western side countries 15 dollars are not enough
I intentionally use the machines over the employees at the McDonalds by my office because the staff tends to be low energy and never thanks the customer so I always end up thanking them because someone should be saying it at the end of the transaction. No job security reward from me.
If they could figure out a way to get the orders right it would be even better. I can't believe they want $15 and hour when they aren't able to make sure what you get is what you ordered. Then they get mad if you point out that they made a mistake. We've given up on them. Haven't been back to any for a couple years.
I never understood why people thought that the restaurant industry is relying automation to combat minimum wage, Minnimum wage or no minimum wage the industry will go to automation. The main goal for any industry is to cut down on expense. For most industries the number one expense is payroll. This argument is just an excuse not to inceease the salaries of workers and keep money to executives. Technology/Automation will take more jobs away from Americans than any other thing/person/country.