Submitted by Shelfrock77 t3_yer544 in singularity
Reply to comment by RavenWolf1 in The Great People Shortage is coming — and it's going to cause global economic chaos | Researchers predict that the world's population will decline in the next 40 years due to declining birth rates — and it will cause a massive shortage of workers. by Shelfrock77
At some point. Meanwhile, in my hood I've got restaurants and stores limiting hours and, in some instances, outright closing because the can't find employees. There's going to be a lot of pain throughout the system as the new automation integrates itself.
If only they paid living wages then that labor shortage would disappear like magic.
Paid living wages and lowered working hours so they have lives outside of work*
The margins are so thin that it often isn't possible to do that. It's not like restaurants choose to shut down because they're really that obstinate about wages, the math just often doesn't work out.
What I see around here is the rent the restaurants have to pay make it really hard to be profitable.
I was talking about this to my friends the other night. Restaurants are in an especially hard place right now. Inflation means people go out to eat less. Supply issues mean everything costs more. Labor shortage and wage hikes means hiring workers is difficult. Inflation also means rents have skyrocketed.
Restaurants are just taking hit after hit after hit. And that's considering that most restaurants fail within a couple of years of opening, anyway.
Something I can't explain myself is why more restaurants didn't jump on a more digital process?
I have seen a few (chain) restaurants where most of the process is supported by an app/website/tablet where you can book your table, see the menu, order stuff and pay for it.
This makes it much easier for the staff and optimizes a lot of the flow. It doesn't remove the ability to ask a human to help you and it makes reordering much easier. Add some AI to the mix and recommandations/promotions could be very opportunistic.
I was at a Panera the other day, and they only allowed ordering from the kiosk in store. They had no one to run the registers. It actually went pretty quick.
Then we have to ask should that business even exists then? I think any business which can't pay living wages shouldn't exists.
There wouldn't have been, had it been introduced years and years and years ago when it should have; nor would it have been as much of a struggle if human beings were actually being paid properly during the transition.
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