italdesign
Level 2 Member
Somewhere on the web, I came across this opinion:
A Bank Officer there recently told me that in 2 years there will not only be no more tellers, there will be no more local branches. They will have regional offices, modeled on a mall based "Apple Store", where there will be Officers to assist you with housing loans, or problems with an account, but no lowly tellers.
I went into a local Chase branch the other day during the mid day lunch hour rush, and the previous 8 teller windows were mostly permanently walled off. Only 2 possible teller windows, and just one teller working. In front of where the old teller windows used to be were 2 new giant freestanding machines. Looking like ATMs on steroids, they were able to do extensive transactions that used to require a human teller. I wanted to withdraw $400 in $100 bills, not the $20s that an ATM would give me, and they had someone there to walk us thru using the new machines instead of waiting in the long teller line. In less than 30 seconds I had my $100 bills and was out the door.
With more and more cities passing $15/hour laws, and heavy health care costs being mandated by Obamacare, along with new Federal regulations gutting bank fees, we are going to see more and more automation. The next step is companies like McDonalds are already putting in machines that can make your burger faster and better than a human. Soon Starbucks will put in machines that can make your Latte better than any barista.
Economics 101: the more you regulate and tax something, the less you get of it. With labor fees and costs going thru the roof, jobs for non-skilled workers are going to be phased out as fast as possible.
Interesting interesting... I have been thinking about this kind of stuff a lot. Marco Rubio famously said "if you raise the minimum wage, you make people more expensive than a machine." And yet, if you don't, you keep people in poverty which leads to crime. So what is the right approach?
When I visited Australia and New Zealand, the basic services seemed better (bus driver, taxi, fast food), while the higher end services seemed worse (restaurant) than US. I attributed the former to higher minimum wage and the latter to lack of tipping. Everyone was more equal, a staple of "socialism". Things were more consistent.
Compare this to the US where you get great service at a sit down restaurant or salon, but horrid treatment on public transportation and call centers. The gap is as wide as the path to hell. And when someone proposes to raise the minimum wage, aka pay the poor ppl better so they rise out of poverty and treat others' better, the reaction is to replace them with machines. Why don't we see Aussies and Scandinavians doing that despite having higher wage for a long time?
Is this all because the gap in America enables the rich to be super rich and they don't want to give part of their wealth to the poor?
A Bank Officer there recently told me that in 2 years there will not only be no more tellers, there will be no more local branches. They will have regional offices, modeled on a mall based "Apple Store", where there will be Officers to assist you with housing loans, or problems with an account, but no lowly tellers.
I went into a local Chase branch the other day during the mid day lunch hour rush, and the previous 8 teller windows were mostly permanently walled off. Only 2 possible teller windows, and just one teller working. In front of where the old teller windows used to be were 2 new giant freestanding machines. Looking like ATMs on steroids, they were able to do extensive transactions that used to require a human teller. I wanted to withdraw $400 in $100 bills, not the $20s that an ATM would give me, and they had someone there to walk us thru using the new machines instead of waiting in the long teller line. In less than 30 seconds I had my $100 bills and was out the door.
With more and more cities passing $15/hour laws, and heavy health care costs being mandated by Obamacare, along with new Federal regulations gutting bank fees, we are going to see more and more automation. The next step is companies like McDonalds are already putting in machines that can make your burger faster and better than a human. Soon Starbucks will put in machines that can make your Latte better than any barista.
Economics 101: the more you regulate and tax something, the less you get of it. With labor fees and costs going thru the roof, jobs for non-skilled workers are going to be phased out as fast as possible.
Interesting interesting... I have been thinking about this kind of stuff a lot. Marco Rubio famously said "if you raise the minimum wage, you make people more expensive than a machine." And yet, if you don't, you keep people in poverty which leads to crime. So what is the right approach?
When I visited Australia and New Zealand, the basic services seemed better (bus driver, taxi, fast food), while the higher end services seemed worse (restaurant) than US. I attributed the former to higher minimum wage and the latter to lack of tipping. Everyone was more equal, a staple of "socialism". Things were more consistent.
Compare this to the US where you get great service at a sit down restaurant or salon, but horrid treatment on public transportation and call centers. The gap is as wide as the path to hell. And when someone proposes to raise the minimum wage, aka pay the poor ppl better so they rise out of poverty and treat others' better, the reaction is to replace them with machines. Why don't we see Aussies and Scandinavians doing that despite having higher wage for a long time?
Is this all because the gap in America enables the rich to be super rich and they don't want to give part of their wealth to the poor?