Artificial Intelligence & Automation: Fast Food Drive-Thru
May I take your order? (And your livelihood?)
Those attentive to recent political and technological occurences in culture have probably heard of Chinese surveillance balloons, inflation, the war in Ukraine, Elon Musk buying the social network Twitter, and a looming Presidential election of untold importance.
But another widely announced subject is also continual in culture: artificial intelligence.
To be sure, for akin to the consistency of AI’s unremitting technical upgrades is its presence in news media.
But my aim here is not to reference the cascading litany of troubling ChatGPT revelations that have already come to pass.
For among artificial intelligence’s many angles that inspire worry in some is its capacity to assume the role of human workers charged with taking orders for guests within the fast food industry.
And though America’s hunger for fast food is as deep-rooted as it has ever been, I do not think it would be stretching the truth to submit that even that might be outmatched by our culture’s cravings for technological change.
I mean only that, whereas the automation of fast food employees is celebrated by our technological chieftains and those presiding at the heights of the company ladder, one can be justified in cogitating as to whether our culture’s lower-level industry workers might view the matter differently.
Those who monitor cultural trends are aware that the topic of automation is nothing new, for it is recognized that the Industrial Revolution did much to promote similar forecasts.
Following the 2009 global financial crisis in the United States, the push to automate blue-collar trades has only hastened.
In today’s highly-technological society, somepeople, according to investigative journalist Jon Rappoport, “see AI as a mirror of themselves. A better version. A faster version. A more comprehensive version. A less biased version.”
In his Substack, Rappoport adds that, “Big Tech and its government partners are going to deploy AI (and already are) wherever they can, to operate the levers of civilization. Which, of course, includes wall to wall surveillance of every person in real time. And factory assembly lines. And medical diagnosis and treatment. And court trials. And prisons. And the daily work of bureaucrats. And policing. And teaching in schools. And the work of clerks in businesses. And Internet search functions. And regulation of vehicle traffic. And the vehicles themselves. And the surveillance and enforcement of diversity, equity, and inclusion. And the surveillance and enforcement of climate change regulations and imposed energy use quotas. And the manufacture of journalism. And news gathering. And the distribution of money. And short and long term planning for the construction, maintenance, and regulation of communities…Because, why not? And many humans will accept these revolutionary changes, since these humans already see themselves as a kind of AI.”
Of course, our larger focus here is the AI-laced automation of human workers.
In speaking of the subject of automating the food-service industry, the chief reasoning for recruiting automation systems is the ongoing labor shortage and increasing labor costs.
In order to survive this dilemma, we are told that the solution is none other than fast-food businesses utilizing advanced technology.
This longstanding continuation of historically utilizing machinery in place of human labor now has companies in the throws of phasing out human workers by deploying artificial intelligence in the workplace and requesting their employees to train these computerized systems to be more human.
Naturally, one could be justified in wondering why a monumental corporation would choose to pay tens of millions of dollars in a grand experiment to install AI at their establishments rather than use the money to pay a human employee, though their reasoning is not difficult to perceive.
My point is not to argue that automation cannot be beneficial for big business and the economy, or that it cannot in the process save capital and precious human energy, or that it is incapable of raising efficiency, or that corporate CEO’s are immoral for leading their companies in the technological direction, or that it would be best to try and curb the storied movement in culture.
I wish only to illustrate some possible consequences that may transpire as a result of relying on advanced machinery in place of human participation.
Perhaps underlining some recent events here might be useful.
One increasingly automated eatery is McDonald’s, who purchased machine learning startup Dynamic Yield for a reported $300 million.
“The system will look at factors such as the weather, time, local events, traffic levels at the restaurant and on nearby roads, historical sales data, currently popular items and even what you're ordering to optimize menu displays at drive-thru windows,” reported Engadget. “It might, for instance, promote the McFlurry or iced coffees on hot days, or suggest simpler items that are faster for employees to prepare if there's a long line.”
As detailed by the website, McDonald’s would eventually install the system in its 14,000 US restaurants, in addition to further aspiring to add it to its self-order kiosks and mobile app, and possibly in kitchens.
According to Daniel Henry, the company’s executive vice president and global chief information officer, the company may further implement license plate recognition, which would allow AI to identify a patron’s car and to customize their menu, as it relates to their purchase history. The company later agreed to acquire Apprente, a Silicon Valley company that uses artificial intelligence to understand drive-thru orders, in an attempt to refine the automation of their drive-thru service.
Among other anxieties, it is believed that the proliferation of automation in the fast-food industry will produce a tidal wave of layoffs that will come to pass through this decade.
As put by a recent Goldman report: “Two-thirds of current jobs are exposed to some degree of AI automation, and that generative AI could substitute up to one-fourth of current work. Extrapolating our estimates globally suggests that generative AI could expose the equivalent of 300 million full-time jobs to automation” as up to “two thirds of occupations could be partially automated by AI.”
Last month, it was reported that the fast food chain Wendy’s, in a partnership with Google, would begin testing an A.I. chatbot that can take orders from customers in drive-thrus. The pilot program, called Wendy’s FreshAI, is to launch at a restaurant in Ohio this month.
As told by Wendy’s CEO Todd Penegor to CNBC’s Jim Cramer, the fast food chain seeks to “drive the restaurant of the future” alongside such technological changes.
As for how the “restaurant of the future” is intended to profit in the long-run fast-food workers who might aspire to be placed at the drive-thru, the Wendy’s CEO did not say.
Nonetheless, some accounts of AI-infused automation can be more revealing than others.
At the Good Times Burgers & Frozen Custard in Denver, Colorado, an employee at the drive-through window is an artificially intelligent voice assistant that handles the restaurant’s breakfast orders.
As detailed by The Washington Post, “She fills a classically American job nearly a century in the making, a rite of passage for generations of teenagers that could be in the very early stages of a mass extinction.”
When the publication asked Erikka Knuti, communications director for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, what kind of message an AI voice assistant sends to customers, she said, “These companies are saying, 'We don't care about you and we don't care if you're getting better service,'" adding that, "They'll say it's more efficient, but I don't know any situation where somebody said, 'I'm really glad that there wasn't somebody there at customer service or checkout when I needed help.’"
Providing yet another discomposing chronicle of the technology might prove helpful in checking those who are quick to gleefully charge an artificially intelligent interface with replacing humans at the drive-thru.
“McDonald's,” as reported by the website TastingTable, “has begun testing a new A.I. ordering system in several stores nationwide, and already it has accrued glaring backlash from fans, who have taken to TikTok to express their disapproval. According to complaints presented in various videos, the A.I. frequently mishears orders, often adding unwanted items or exorbitant quantities. In other instances, the A.I. overhears orders spoken by other customers in different drive-thru lines and adds those items as well. Not only is this frustrating for customers, it's the pits for the real human beings working inside the restaurant to assemble orders who are just as confused (and, now, also tasked with remaking incorrectly-placed orders and dealing with angry drive-thru guests). Worse, drive-thru A.I. might not just be an underperforming headache, but a tactic for upselling customers and making orders more expensive.”
The website goes on to say, “In one TikTok, the McDonald's A.I. adds a soda that TikTok user @resinsbiren didn't want, and when they request for it to be removed, the system glitches and adds eight sweet teas. Indeed, the errors are so egregious as to be comical, like in another TikTok where the A.I. tacks on 28 orders of McNuggets despite the poster howling with laughter and telling it to stop. For as innocuous as these mishaps might seem, some less tech-savvy customers (or anyone in a rush, or who didn't get a receipt) might not notice the additional items in their order and be scammed into paying more for things they didn't want in the first place.”
In the face of these facts, some maintain that the technology will somehow not devour humans who are tasked with working at fast food drive-thrus.
Those who balk at this long-forecasted result in culture might do well to heed the words of Presto automation chairman and interim CEO Krishna Gupta, who told Bloomberg Technology that, “I don’t think in three years there’s going to be a single drive-thru having a human take your orders,” adding, “Voicebots—whether that’s ours or someone else’s—will be pervasive. They will never get tired of delivering perfect service…”
Likewise, Ben Goertzel, who spoke at the Web Summit technology conference in May, said that roughly eighty percent of existing jobs could be automated by artificial intelligence. He also said that he views this trend not as a threat, but as a benefit.
As for solutions to how eighty percent of the population being put out of work might provide for their families with no income, or how the condition of current drive-thru workers might be improved from the transition, the AI guru did not say.
Apparently, nor have the frenzied cheerleaders of artificial intelligence.
Still, other results from the technology are worth grasping.
One study from researchers at the University of Georgia, which was published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, showed that employees who work with AI are more likely to suffer from loneliness and insomnia, in addition to choosing to drink alcohol following the completion of the work day.
“The rapid advancement in AI systems is sparking a new industrial revolution that is reshaping the workplace with many benefits but also some uncharted dangers, including potentially damaging mental and physical impacts for employees,” remarked lead researcher Pok Man Tang, assistant professor of management at the University of Georgia.
“Humans are social animals, and isolating work with AI systems may have damaging spillover effects into employees' personal lives.” The researcher added that, “AI will keep expanding so we need to act now to lessen the potentially damaging effects for people who work with these systems.” Interestingly, the findings were consistent across cultures.1
As I have already said, the issue of artificial intelligence is nothing new in culture, for we know that sundry dark premonitions have been projected since the Industrial Revolution. And we will recall that, whereas some predictions have come to pass, others may have been overstated.
Yet the effects of automation in culture are clear to see.
It cannot be refuted that scores of bookkeepers, cashiers, telephone operators and automotive assembly line workers have had their jobs eliminated in the past two decades as increasingly fleet and affordable software and automated machinery replaced some of their tasks in factories and offices.
What I am trying to impart here is that these kind of changes in culture will only intensify.
As the floodgate of automation has been raised, it is not difficult to show how, aside from the food-service industry, retail, agriculture, manufacturing, construction, legal, healthcare, finance, debt management systems, and law enforcement and judicial sectors have already been significantly automated.
Many economists contend that automation can benefit the labor market by spurring economic growth, reducing prices and increasing demand, in addition to creating additional jobs to compensate for those lost.
We are also told that automating everything permits those who are being automated to focus on other things, more important matters, tasks that are more worthy of human concentration.
But careful readers will keep in mind the past experiences of former customer service representatives who came to be bested by technology’s benefaction.
Indeed, for flying in the face of the bright outlook offered to society is the reality of artificially intelligent “chatbots,” who have replaced many customer service representatives who, before this age of technological advancement, were looked towards to resolve customers’ questions and concerns.
Moreover, another angle to the decision to automate everything in existence is that it often fails to address important queries in culture.
As put by author Neil Postman, “In automating the operation of political, social, and commercial enterprises, computers may or may not have made them more efficient but they have certainly diverted attention from the question whether or not such enterprises are necessary or how they might be improved. A university, a political party, a religious denomination, a judicial proceeding, even corporate board meetings are not improved by automating their operations. They are made more imposing, more technical, perhaps more authoritative, but defects in their assumptions, ideas, and theories will remain untouched.”2
Which is, of course, the situation I am attempting to address, for it is well to remember that technology always carries with it a compound of both problems and solutions.
And as the world of employment brings about a unified focus on high-tech gear never before seen encountered throughout the corporate sphere, it is important to envisage who is to reap the benefits of this mechanically-charged employment-culture envisioned by our digital architects, and who is to suffer the consequences.
I will conclude here with the words of Rappoport, who further asserts that the current AI situation in culture amounts to a “war for the soul,” adding that, “Which, if we lose, leads directly into the technocratic Brave New World of Huxley. If you notice, Huxley didn’t bother to explain how the world took that drastic turn, ending up in a fake utopia. We’re living through that turn right now.”
“No Person Is an Island: Unpacking the Work and After-Work Consequences of Interacting With Artificial Intelligence” by Pok Man Tang, Joel Koopman, Ke Michael Mai, David De Cremer, Jack H. Zhang, Philipp Reynders, Chin Tung Stewart Ng and I-Heng Chen, 12 June 2023, Journal of Applied Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/apl0001103
Neil Postman, Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, P 116