Fast food protests: March in downtown Los Angeles, cities nationwide

[NobleSavage]

Fast-food workers and their supporters rallied in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday as part of a wave of protests planned in 160 cities around the nation advocating for $15-an-hour pay.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fast-food-protests-20141204-story.html

Perfect timing to announce a A New Burger-Flippin' Robot

A company called Momentum Machines has built a robot that could radically alter the fast food industry and have some line cooks looking for new jobs.

The company’s robot can “slice toppings like tomatoes and pickles immediately before it places the slice onto your burger, giving you the freshest burger possible.” The robot is “more consistent, more sanitary, and can produce ~360 hamburgers per hour.” That’s one burger burger every ten seconds.

The next generation of the device will offer “custom meat grinds for every single customer. Want a patty with 1/3 pork and 2/3 bison ground to order? No problem.”

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Most fast food restaurants receive pre-sliced tomatoes and pickles. In other news, scientist discover that most humans can put a pickle and tomato on a burger in under 3 seconds.

 

[NobleSavage]

Most fast food restaurants receive pre-sliced tomatoes and pickles. In other news, scientist discover that most humans can put a pickle and tomato on a burger in under 3 seconds.

My money is on the robots.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

You don't have to pay em. But when they break down. No burgers and no social interactions your species love so much.

 

[Mageth]

Have they got a robot that can squash a burger into an unrecognizable and unappetizing blob?

 

[AthenaAwakened]

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fast-food-protests-20141204-story.html

Perfect timing to announce a A New Burger-Flippin' Robot

A company called Momentum Machines has built a robot that could radically alter the fast food industry and have some line cooks looking for new jobs.

The company’s robot can “slice toppings like tomatoes and pickles immediately before it places the slice onto your burger, giving you the freshest burger possible.” The robot is “more consistent, more sanitary, and can produce ~360 hamburgers per hour.” That’s one burger burger every ten seconds.

The next generation of the device will offer “custom meat grinds for every single customer. Want a patty with 1/3 pork and 2/3 bison ground to order? No problem.”

So let me get this straight.

Shut the hell up with your complaints about your burger flipping job or we start installing robots. But as long as you take our shitty treatment and our shitty wages you can work this shitty job forever and we will never mechanize.

Is that it?

 

[NobleSavage]

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fast-food-protests-20141204-story.html

Perfect timing to announce a A New Burger-Flippin' Robot

So let me get this straight.

Shut the hell up with your complaints about your burger flipping job or we start installing robots. But as long as you take our shitty treatment and our shitty wages you can work this shitty job forever and we will never mechanize.

Is that it?

I'm not making any kind of moral judgment; I'm just saying it's gonna happen. We all bitch at Walmart (I'm guilty) but what about Amazon, Walmart's biggest competitor? There entire damn operation is run by Kiva Robots. Amazon freaking bought the company it worked so well. It's just not if, but when.

 

[Jayjay]

Have they got a robot that can squash a burger into an unrecognizable and unappetizing blob?

Yes. And the next generation robots will be able to customize the squashing. Want a burger that looks 1/3rd like a dried dog turd, and 2/3rds like that YouTube video your grandma made when she got her cyst drained? You got it.

 

[NobleSavage]

Have they got a robot that can squash a burger into an unrecognizable and unappetizing blob?

Yes. And the next generation robots will be able to customize the squashing. Want a burger that looks 1/3rd like a dried dog turd, and 2/3rds like that YouTube video your grandma made when she got her cyst drained? You got it.

And you will get a cell phone app to order it just the way you want it, ready when you get there.

I think there is a company that is trying the Redbox model to take a chunk out of Starbcks. Basically, it's a big machine that can give you any kind of fancy coffee hybrids. You will have an app on your phone and it will remember exactally what you want and then you can pay for it with NFC payments. You may love your barista, but most people just don't give a shit.

 

[Archimedes]

Have they got a robot that can squash a burger into an unrecognizable and unappetizing blob?

Can someone tell me what's wrong with this picture?

 

[ZiprHead]

Wait 'til that machine breaks down and no one is there to make burgers and it will take the repair person hours to get there (better yet, right at lunchtime rush).

 

[lpetrich]

There's a certain little thing called capital cost. Such fast-food machines won't be very busy compared to TV-dinner-factory machines and the like, something which will likely make it difficult to pay for their purchase. But if their cost comes down from economies of scale, then I'm sure that they will substitute for some fast-food workers no matter how little those workers are paid.

Furthermore, such machines will need maintenance, and there will be other difficult-to-automate tasks that human workers will still be needed for in the near future. If those can be automated, then a large fraction of other work can also be automated. NobleSavage, how would you react if your job was automated out of existence? Especially if you could not find another one because most other jobs had been automated out of existence.

 

[DBT]

Yes. And the next generation robots will be able to customize the squashing. Want a burger that looks 1/3rd like a dried dog turd, and 2/3rds like that YouTube video your grandma made when she got her cyst drained? You got it.

And you will get a cell phone app to order it just the way you want it, ready when you get there.

I think there is a company that is trying the Redbox model to take a chunk out of Starbcks. Basically, it's a big machine that can give you any kind of fancy coffee hybrids. You will have an app on your phone and it will remember exactally what you want and then you can pay for it with NFC payments. You may love your barista, but most people just don't give a shit.

So what happens come the day that all these companies have mechanized their goods and services, and all the employees who originally did the work and had a disposable income, however pitiful, but are now on the scrap heap and have no money to buy the very same goods and services that are now mechanized?

 

[NobleSavage]

There's a certain little thing called capital cost. Such fast-food machines won't be very busy compared to TV-dinner-factory machines and the like, something which will likely make it difficult to pay for their purchase. But if their cost comes down from economies of scale, then I'm sure that they will substitute for some fast-food workers no matter how little those workers are paid.

Furthermore, such machines will need maintenance, and there will be other difficult-to-automate tasks that human workers will still be needed for in the near future. If those can be automated, then a large fraction of other work can also be automated. NobleSavage, how would you react if your job was automated out of existence? Especially if you could not find another one because most other jobs had been automated out of existence.

Baxtor $25K http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baxter_(robot)

In ten years it'll be $500.

Of course I wouldn't like it if my job got automated out of existence, but how I feel about it is irrelevant. White collar workers are definitely on the chopping block as well. Did you see Watson kick human ass on Jeopardy? Soon it'll be kicking Doctor's asses: http://www.forbes.com/sites/bruceup...ts-its-first-piece-of-business-in-healthcare/

And you don't need to buy a Watson supercomputer, you can just use it's API http://www.ibm.com/smarterplanet/us/en/ibmwatson/developercloud/

 

[NobleSavage]

And you will get a cell phone app to order it just the way you want it, ready when you get there.

I think there is a company that is trying the Redbox model to take a chunk out of Starbcks. Basically, it's a big machine that can give you any kind of fancy coffee hybrids. You will have an app on your phone and it will remember exactally what you want and then you can pay for it with NFC payments. You may love your barista, but most people just don't give a shit.

So what happens come the day that all these companies have mechanized their goods and services, and all the employees who originally did the work and had a disposable income, however pitiful, but are now on the scrap heap and have no money to buy the very same goods and services that are now mechanized?

You will see the big evil corporations push for more welfare. The big retailers already are.

 

[DBT]

So what happens come the day that all these companies have mechanized their goods and services, and all the employees who originally did the work and had a disposable income, however pitiful, but are now on the scrap heap and have no money to buy the very same goods and services that are now mechanized?

You will see the big evil corporations push for more welfare. The big retailers already are.

Where do they think the money to provide for the welfare (living expenses) of a large percentage of the population comes from?

 

[NobleSavage]

I'm guessing individual income tax is the greatest share. As long as the economy is doing well the government can extract taxes, somehow. Is there any rule of economics that says the economy must have human workers?

 

[scombrid]

Wait 'til that machine breaks down and no one is there to make burgers and it will take the repair person hours to get there (better yet, right at lunchtime rush).

There will be somebody there that knows how to configure and troubleshoot the machine, the person that is now the shift manager. The machine will replace the 5 other people that do things like assemble the "burgers" and babble into the talkie thingy at the drive through. There might be a human cleaning person for awhile too.

 

[dismal]

What they really need to develop is robot protestors.

That way these fast food workers can spend their free time getting some marketable skills or looking for a better job.

 

[Mageth]

What they really need to develop is robot protestors.

Will you accept the task of protecting Sarah Connor?