California Fast-food Workers Losing Jobs as $20 Minimum Wage Kicks In

Friday, March 29, 2024

Fast food workers are losing their jobs in California as more restaurant chains prepare to meet a new $20 minimum wage set to go into effect next week.

Posted by oneironaut at 06:31 PM | 25 COMMENTS | permalink | Comment on This Entry |

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Nobody saw that coming...Not.

Many of those jobs will be replaced by a kiosk.

Cute robots don't get paid but they are expensive and high maintenance.

High Wages on dead end jobs spur automation. They Turbo-Charge it.

...Pretty soon,even "Good Jobs",get destroyed by technology taking the need for them away.

The Future is UBI and robots.

Leisure for the masses,but no wealth,..only the Very Few,with money to buy policy will be secure,but good phones and distractions will be plentiful to the proles.

It will be.

Brave New World.

#1 | Posted by Effeteposer at 2024-03-27 08:04 PM | Reply

Labor cost is maybe 18% of the cost of running a fast food store.

It seems inevitable that the minimum wage will need to be replaced with a universal basic income.

#2 | Posted by snoofy at 2024-03-27 08:08 PM | Reply | Newsworthy 3

This is very predictable. Kiosks are now cheaper than human labor.

#3 | Posted by BellRinger at 2024-03-28 10:54 AM | Reply | Funny: 1

Labor cost is maybe 18% of the cost of running a fast food store.

My research indicates its around 25-30%

It seems inevitable that the minimum wage will need to be replaced with a universal basic income.
#2 | POSTED BY SNOOFY

Will it include vacations, perhaps a per diem, new computers every three years, perhaps a bitcoin miner? Can citizens collect UBI and move to Mexico?

Do newcomers collect UBI as well? I don't see why not.

Also needs to be 20% greater then cost of living, otherwise how are they going to get off of UBI?

Or who would want to I suppose.

The Future is UBI and robots.

I recommend understanding Fiat money and the French Revolution.

Kiosks are now cheaper than human labor.
#3 | POSTED BY BELLRINGER

Kiosks will always be just below labor costs, why would they be much less than the cost of labor?

#4 | Posted by oneironaut at 2024-03-28 11:34 AM | Reply

"My research indicates its around 25-30%"

You suck at research.

#5 | Posted by snoofy at 2024-03-28 11:39 AM | Reply | Newsworthy 1

25% to 35% isn't uncommon. It depends on the business. $648k a year per crew, per unit, is the average for a McDonalds franchise, turning an annual profit of $189k to the franchise owner at a 7% average margin. 15% is going to McDonalds for rent and fees. The average franchise owner has 8 locations. So paying out $5.1 million in annual salaries and making $1.5 million pre-tax income. The cost of opening each franchise was around $2 million, before Covid inflation. 11 years to break even per store if everything works out.

Car washes and self-storage are way faster returns.

#6 | Posted by sitzkrieg at 2024-03-29 08:22 PM | Reply

Around these parts, fast food outlets found the money to raise wages by almost fifty percent post pandemic.
Something about needing people to make and serve the food.

#7 | Posted by northguy3 at 2024-03-29 08:27 PM | Reply | Newsworthy 3

Something about needing people to make and serve the food.

Sometimes referred to as "The Market".

#8 | Posted by REDIAL at 2024-03-29 08:45 PM | Reply

"A Congressional Budget Office study in December, meanwhile, estimated that increasing the current federal hourly minimum from $7.25 to $17 by 2029 would offer higher pay to some 18 million people, but also cost about 700,000 jobs, as employers cut labor costs."
www.msn.com

So Republicans say these 700,000 job losses are worse than 18,000,000 workers getting a raise.

No surprise there. Any excuse to avoid raising wages will do.

#9 | Posted by snoofy at 2024-03-29 09:05 PM | Reply

"Around these parts, fast food outlets found the money to raise wages by almost fifty percent post pandemic."

It's already "baked" in around here.

Most fast food places around here had already raised wages to $20 an hour. A few restaurants did not even open again and stayed pickup/delivery only after the pandemic.

I just saw a sign the other day for KFC, hiring starting at $20.

Who knows what's going on down south in LA anymore. I avoid that place like the plague.

#10 | Posted by donnerboy at 2024-03-30 12:09 PM | Reply

Kiosks will always be just below labor costs, why would they be much less than the cost of labor?
#4 | POSTED BY ONEIRONAUT AT 2024-03-28 11:34 AM | REPLY: Actually not 'just below' as much cheaper in the long run. No wages or the FICA and Soc Sec match to those wages [those matches are in addition to the wages]. Also no health care costs as digital computers take little maintenance. Also, the never call off ; )

#11 | Posted by MSgt at 2024-03-30 03:20 PM | Reply

Meanwhile at In N Out the beat goes on. The company has long been a leader in paying its associates so as to get the best employees who commit to working hard. Funny how that works out ...

#12 | Posted by catdog at 2024-03-30 04:11 PM | Reply

#3 "Also needs to be 20% greater then cost of living, otherwise how are they going to get off of UBI?"

NOBODY gets off of UBI. That's the U - UNIVERSAL basic income. It's NOT means tested.

#13 | Posted by DarkVader at 2024-03-30 04:44 PM | Reply

"I just saw a sign the other day for KFC, hiring starting at $20."

At Buc-ees they have signs up that employees that go into management can make six figures.

Anyone who tells you the money isn't there is either lying.*

*I concede it's also possible they are a franchisee who is getting fleeced by the parent company, is too stupid to realize it, and deserves to go out of business because they aren't any good at business.

#14 | Posted by snoofy at 2024-03-30 05:48 PM | Reply

The money is in the consumers. The prices just go up. The big mac has followed inflation for a long time.

#15 | Posted by sitzkrieg at 2024-03-31 01:02 PM | Reply

I need some person to be slightly above slavery for me to eat garbage food! /s

#16 | Posted by Brennnn at 2024-03-31 01:13 PM | Reply

#16

Their tears do add a certain zest to the entree I don't get in high wage restaurants.

#17 | Posted by TaoWarrior at 2024-03-31 01:39 PM | Reply

Meanwhile at In N Out the beat goes on. The company has long been a leader in paying its associates so as to get the best employees who commit to working hard. Funny how that works out ...

#12 | POSTED BY CATDOG

People Waited 8 Hours In Line For Idaho's First Taste Of In-N-Out

ca.finance.yahoo.com

People waited 8 hours for "fast food". Some literally camped out overnight in freezing temperatures just to get a double double.

The People love their fast food.

#18 | Posted by donnerboy at 2024-03-31 03:31 PM | Reply

Too bad, so sad ...

#19 | Posted by THEBULL at 2024-03-31 05:43 PM | Reply

The poor get poorer and the rich richer.

The government was supposed to protect the working class.

Instead, they've been bought off by the wealthy.

It's unsustainable.

#20 | Posted by ClownShack at 2024-03-31 05:45 PM | Reply

The poor get poorer and the rich richer.
The government was supposed to protect the working class.
Instead, they've been bought off by the wealthy.
It's unsustainable.

#20 | POSTED BY CLOWNSHACK

Explain?

#21 | Posted by oneironaut at 2024-03-31 05:48 PM | Reply

NOBODY gets off of UBI. That's the U - UNIVERSAL basic income. It's NOT means tested.
#13 | POSTED BY DARKVADER

THEN everything will be INFLATED again, its seriously not that difficult to understand.

#22 | Posted by oneironaut at 2024-03-31 05:49 PM | Reply

Meanwhile at In N Out the beat goes on. The company has long been a leader in paying its associates so as to get the best employees who commit to working hard. Funny how that works out ...
#12 | POSTED BY CATDOG

Until they left Oakland, then they became a bunch of greedsters.

#23 | Posted by oneironaut at 2024-03-31 05:50 PM | Reply

Until they left Oakland, then they became a bunch of greedsters.

#23 | POSTED BY ONEIRONAUT

Shows what you know.

In-N-Out just opened its first restaurant in Idaho. And it's paying workers 141% above the state's minimum wage.
Nancy Luna Dec 13, 2023, 01:43

The starting wage for the 80 employees at the Meridian, Idaho, location is $17.50 per hour, the Southern California burger chain said. That's $10 more than the state's current minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. The average wage for fast food workers in the state is $11.25 an hour, according to a 2023 Idaho wage survey.

www.businessinsider.in

#24 | Posted by donnerboy at 2024-03-31 06:14 PM | Reply

That guy only likes to show us what he doesn't know.

Which, is ample.

#25 | Posted by ClownShack at 2024-03-31 06:24 PM | Reply