McDonald's (MCD) shares were at their all-time high thanks to a new employment-related decision we saw coming… replacing human cashiers with touchscreen screens.
They plan to install this technology in 2500 locations in the United States. Yes, you read well: two thousand and five hundred.
What McDonald's calls "Experience of the Future" is actually a massive employee cutout. More jobs are obsolete. Investors celebrate. His stocks are increasing. The system becomes even more automated, functional and effective.
MC DONALD'S: HDP OR OBVIEDAD PIONEERS?
The decision was obvious.
A robot doesn't do job trials, doesn't get pregnant, he's not late, he doesn't need to go to the bathroom, he doesn't get sick and works 24 hours straight without getting angry.
McDonald's goal is to generate more and more revenue. Lowering costs is one way to do it. Generating employment is a cost. Very efficient indeed. It allows you to stand out from the competition using those additional resources for advertising purposes, investments or lowering your prices and complicating the market.
The world celebrates. Your stocks go up and you'll keep doing it. Many more companies will follow suit. And yes, those who do will become richer.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO MY EMPLOYMENT?
The reality is that we are entering an era of mass layoffs globally. Technology is making multiple professions obsolete.
Uber destroyed the taxi driver. Uber drivers will soon be unemployed thanks to the implementation of autonomous vehicles. This will also happen with drivers and truckers. It's inevitable.
What do you think will happen to the architects? Who will hire one when we can download the $10 plans of the home of our choice from the internet? Did you know that an app will be able to calculate exactly how many screws are needed to build your next home and recommend companies that charge cheaper? The "turnkey" concept will be sold even to buy a house. It will even calculate based on your salary and seniority automatically which bank will give you the loan at the lowest interest. Banks that will only exist virtually.
Hundreds of professions will be obsolete. It's inevitable. It is impossible to compete when the human being is the wheel stick of an organization. Successful companies will be less and bigger.
SO, WHAT'S UP?
As long as humanity's goal is ACUMULATION we are lost.
Our responsibility begins from acceptance, continues with training and is crowned with action.
I personally made this decision earlier. Having worked in the private sector, collaborating in the public and having been closely linked to social work, I consider this issue to be our next urgency.
A lot of people will be left out. It's inevitable. Many of my friends and family will be affected. Probably more than one of you who's reading me. The future of employment as we know it is at risk.
You'll wonder what I'm doing by writing these words on my blog. How many people can read it? ¿50, 100, 1000? That doesn't change the world. I know. That's why I don't publish almost anything I do every day. Because you don't have to. But to your surprise, every time I write something like this I get private messages on Facebook, Skype or Whatsapp from friends who want to know more and generate very constructive discussions. They're little grains of sand. It all adds up.
CHE, AND HOW DO YOU FIX THIS?
You can't help what's going on. You don't have to think of it as a solution but as a reality. Evolution and progress defines us as human beings.
I believe we should act on the following points:
1. Accept. Those of us who have the opportunity, train. Team action.
2. Give emotional, financial shelter and sustain the quality of life of those who will inevitably be left out.
3. Update education to cope with the changes ahead. Teach to think about equipment
.4. Awareness of the structural changes that we must take on society and our role as individuals in it.
5. Eliminate the accumulation of collective thought as synonymous with success.
"CHAMIGO, I'M AFRAID OF THIS. WON'T IT BE VERY CATASTROPHIC?"
It makes sense that it frightens. The problem is in the background. If we think the solution is to try to sustain something that doesn't work, we're lost.
Machines must work at the service of the human being. That's what we created them for. To make our lives easier.
We have an incredible brain and capabilities that have historically stood out from the rest of the living beings. It is our duty to use it for general well-being.
If machines solve our daily needs we will have more time to use our time on really important things: reversing climate change, rebuilding the planet's resources, improving the quality of life of all living things that live here and thinking together.
FINAL SYNTHESIS
I'm excited to imagine a world where our grandchildren study history and see us as prehistoric fighting to impose their identity.
I imagine whole generations laughing at how we fought over a football team, how we discriminated against a person for their skin color or worse, for their sexual choice. It sounds so ridiculous, so prehistoric. But it's still in effect.
But the day will also come where these young people take for obvious the ridiculousness of the accumulation that prevents us from progressing as a society.
That is why, dear friends and family, we have to understand that we are often frightened by ignorance. Because we are so immersed in the film that we are ahead that we realize that we are spectators sitting comfortably in front of the screen, letting life happen before our eyes.
You'll find me here. I always slow to look forward. Like a little ant. No matter if I'll ever get to live that world I think will come. But simply imagining it already makes it possible.
While I enjoy the road. Finding more and more ants that understand me by just looking us in the eye. No need to talk. We already understand each other…
Because we're going the same way: go ahead. Always.
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