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Servicing Out

I took my best friend out for dinner as a birthday treat a few weeks ago. One of the first times I have sat indoors in a restaurant with everyone including the wait-staff being mask-less. It felt awkward and uncomfortable. Everyone around seemed to be trying too hard to make things appear normal. This was far from a dinner time scene pre-Covid times. We were all making an effort that is for sure. 

Our waiter was a young kid who aimed to be nice and friendly but was not sure if he was getting too close to us for comfort. So he lurched back anytime he felt he might be less than six feet away from our table. It was an acrobatic effort for him to land all the food and drinks safely on the far edge of the table while staying away from us. Times have clearly changed and in some cases there is not path to return to "normalcy". The robotic service option may grow more wide-spread with more spill-over effects:

..suppose you’re a business, and labor suddenly becomes really expensive, so you decide to install an automated ordering system for the customers. Then you think “Hmm, wait a second, could I also use an automated system for the wait staff, hosts, and chefs to communicate instead of having to walk over and talk to each other?” So they go around looking for more communication tools to buy. Software companies realize this is a big market, and start making more and better restaurant productivity tools. Along the way they develop cool new methods of remote communication that other software companies adapt for completely different markets, like factories or big-box retailers. Innovation leads to more innovation.

The way this cycle of innovation would go would be to remove people from the service business which can be a good thing if these folks can move into jobs that are better paying and more interesting. It is unclear that would be the case though.

but lots of people who stop being waiters in restaurants will end up doing things that it’s hard for us to predict. The thing is, humankind has had many waves of technological innovation before, and somehow there is still plenty of work for everyone to do

This logic does not account for the fact that in many cases these employees are not wait-staff despite having ample choice of employment and creating new jobs are are require skills far higher than what they have or are likely to gain will not make their employment prospects that much better. The spill-over will end up being at the lower-end creating opportunities of  Lime Juicer ilk. 



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