RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINES
You’ve probably read the recent ‘scare’ stories that a large proportion of people in the workplace will, in the not too distant future, be replaced by robots.
Almost 250,000 public sector workers could lose their jobs to robots over the next 15 years, according to a report which claims machines would be more efficient and save billions of pounds.
There’s a serious lack of joined-up thinking here.
H.M.R.C. is always owed billions by tax avoiders and evaders, so why would the Government agree to replace a quarter of a million human workers who do pay income tax and National Insurance with machines that won’t contribute to the state?
In many shops and supermarkets, machines have already started to replace humans and no one seems to be complaining . . . except me.
I’m talking about self-service check-outs and tills – which I absolutely loathe and refuse to use.
If you don’t share my loathing or have never given them much thought, you should.
Apart from the fact they replaced ‘real’ staff members, they can be a right pain in the neck to use.
Nobody wants to be made to look foolish by a robot voice telling them they’ve ‘placed an incorrect item in the bagging area’. Three times!
A well-known High Street newsagent I often visit has two tills on the counter plus two self-service tills, between which a staff member continually hovers, helping customers having trouble with them.
Why not scrap the self-service tills and put the ‘hovering helper’ behind the unused third till on the counter so human customers can interact with human staff?
Otherwise it’s possible that one day I’ll walk into the shop to find four self-service tills and no staff.