Food workers $20 inflation crisis - economy - US

[iced]

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@Shooting-For-800 wrote:

So many issues with high minimum wages.

For starters, owners can hire more skilled workers which actually hurts the ones that it was supposed to help.

Of course, owners may hire less workers because of the overall budgets.

Increases overall costs which raises prices.

Now you know why you have to check yourself out at WalMart.

Whats next? Cooking your own fries?

America is a free market and it should be treated that way.

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You'll be checking yourself out at Wal-Mart regardless of the minimum wage because technology is working to automate those types of jobs into oblivion. It is also getting close to being able to do it at a lower cost than even a low minimum wage. Why pay a human $20/hour -- or even $7/hour -- to run a single register when you can replace 10 registers with kiosks for a one-time capital expenditure and hire one person at $20/hour (or $7) to manage 10 kiosks? Kiosks don't need health insurance, 401ks, or vacation either. Cashiers will be something that grandparents can regail their grandkids with stories about, along with VCRs and landline phones.

TLDR: the smart businesses are/will be hiring fewer workers because automation is becoming cheaper than labor. Raising the minimum wage will help those workers for a bit, but it also accelerates the movement toward automation. It is a double-edged sword, though most of those jobs are going to be obsolete either way. It's a matter of when, not if.

[FicoMike0]

I just remembered, the cook your own steak place was in ca, lancaster, ca. Ah, the lovely antelope valley and the high mojave. Memories from my youth. Nice drive out from lax. I think I feel a song coming on,

Coming into Los Angeles
Bringing in a couple of keys
Don't touch my bags if you please
Mister customs man, yeah

[CorpCrMgr1]

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@FicoMike0 wrote:

I just remembered, the cook your own steak place was in ca, lancaster, ca. Ah, the lovely antelope valley and the high mojave. Memories from my youth. Nice drive out from lax. I think I feel a song coming on,

Coming into Los Angeles
Bringing in a couple of keys
Don't touch my bags if you please
Mister customs man, yeah

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@FicoMike0 The cook your own steak is also in Michigan. The first time I went I liked it. Enough that I've gone back. FWIW, fast food was the hardest job I ever had. The bosses were mean. 

[Rogue46]

This is a tough topic and I can see both sides of the argument but I don't think in the end it's helpful for anyone involved. Sure making $20 per hour working minimum wage is great for the worker but when prices go up (and they will)  it will level out so what's the point? I owned a pizzeria for many years and the idea of being forced to pay $20/hr to a brand new worker that has zero experience makes little sense. What about the experienced workers? Do they jump up to $30/hr?  Some of the big corporations can pivot out of that but small businesses won't be able to.

[FicoMike0]

@CorpCrMgr1  I went back a couple of times.  Weren't many good places to eat in landscatter, back then.  We were testing an antisatellite missile at nearby Edwards afb.  We were going to "make space in space". We called it the "hot metal kill". Big on slogans.  Our first attempt was successful, we turned one piece of space junk into 137 pieces.  They all just hung in orbit. Nasa was pissed. Norad was too. They counted the pieces. A lot of extra radar tracking. We were cancelled! No more all expense paid vacations to LA and the high mojave. No more asm-137 missile. Wasn't much to look at anyway. Fast, though.  Closing speed of up to 40,000 feet per sec. Try out running that, Tom Cruise!

[CorpCrMgr1]

@FicoMike0 your job sounds more interesting than mine. 

[FicoMike0]

It had its moments.  Mostly sitting I meetings.  Pushing paper. Flogging data. We knew the right answer, so we tortured the data until we got it. 

I remember watching video of aerial missile intercepts. Nothing like in the movies. We knew the exact time of intercept, so we single framed to that time. Usually, we could catch both the missile and target in one frame. Watching realtime, you couldn't see the missile, way to fast.