Invasion of the Fast-Food Robots

Robots are coming for more Americans’ jobs — and you can blame the Fight for $15 fanatics. Wendy’s is now moving to install self-service kiosks in 1,000 of its restaurants (about a sixth of its total) by year’s end. The point is to save on labor costs, which are soaring thanks to radical jumps in the minimum wage to as much as $15 an hour in places like New York and California.

“Last year was tough — 5 percent wage inflation,” says Wendy’s COO Bob Wright. That was more than twice the 2.1 percent overall inflation rate. And he’s expecting wages to climb almost as fast this year, too.

But automation, Wright says, can shave 31 hours a week of paid labor from a single restaurant — almost a full-time job. Say goodbye to nearly 1,000 jobs — for starters.

Wright warns that robots can take on other work: “repetitive production tasks” that aren’t “core” to what customers love.

And the trend runs far beyond Wendy’s. Panera Bread, McDonald’s and others are adding touch-screen kiosks. At Cafe X in San Francisco, a robotic arm prepares and serves coffee.

It’s hard to blame firms facing a sky-high $15 minimum wage for looking to rein in costs, but the toll is ugly. Job-loss estimates from a $15 minimum in New York alone run as high as 600,000 — from automation as well as shops closing and just trimming staff.

Meanwhile, a new Heritage Foundation report predicts a $15 mandatory wage floor will push up fast-food prices “at least a fourth.” And since lower-income groups rely more on fast food and other products made by minimum-wage workers, they’ll be hit hardest.

“Minimum-wage increases,” the report concludes, “do little to redistribute wealth.”

Great: Humans lose their jobs. Machines take over. And the poor don’t even benefit.

And you can thank the US labor movement.