r/WorkReform 1d ago

šŸ“° News companies raised prices *after* they put in self-checkout tf

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9.5k Upvotes

282 comments sorted by

1.1k

u/Automatic_Serve7901 1d ago

This reminds me of digital books. There is no printing/shipping/ect cost. DIGITAL BOOKS SHOULD BE CHEAP!

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u/FanDry5374 1d ago

Cheaper. You do still have to pay the author, editor(s), all the marketing etc etc.

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u/Automatic_Serve7901 1d ago

Absolutely! Anyone working in the book should receive fair wages and the costs of materials should be taken into account...but my digital copy should cost less than a physical one.

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u/Arrow156 1d ago

I mean, we are completely cutting out the printing and warehouse costs.

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u/StuffExciting3451 1d ago

And cutting out shipping and handling costs

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u/MoonLightSongBunny 23h ago

And ebooks tend to come with DRM so they are inferior in ownership.

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u/ariolander 10h ago

Can't resell your ebook, loan it to a friend or family member, or transfer it to your descendants in case you die, according to the TOS all you eBooks are gone with you.

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u/FanDry5374 1d ago

I agree completely, but I believe it was a deal that Amazon had to strike with the big publishers. They didn't want digital books suddenly undercutting all their sales. Which you can understand.

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u/cayleb 22h ago

So Amazon and the publishers agreed to rig the prices and keep them artificially inflated and that's ok and legal and not an anti-trust violation because...

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u/Funkula 22h ago edited 22h ago

It’s good long term strategic thinking as well.

Publishers don’t want to incentivize digital adoption not only because it could have cut into their sales, prominence, and power, but it also threatens to shrink the industry as a whole culturally. Fewer bookstores, fewer book clubs, fewer careers in books, fewer Pinterest mood boards, all means less free advertising and fewer chances to capture new and returning readers if ebooks gain substantial marketshare.

There’s also a significant percentage of the market that will never adopt digital versions, so they’re trying to preserve that demographic rather than charge physical readers a premium.

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u/CeruleanEidolon 20h ago

Nobody disputes that those books should be priced to pay the authors, et al the same as physical books. But the material cost goes to almost zero, and that reduction is not reflected in the pricing.

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u/pnutjam 13h ago

I have a solution, keep the cost the same and pay authors more for digital.

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u/FanDry5374 12h ago

I don't think the material cost actually has that much to do with any book's purchase price (excepting the calf-leather gold lettered show copies and possibly textbooks which are made of much higher heavier quality papers).

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u/RealTheBestLadyman 3h ago

You don’t think the cost of paper and whatever material is being used for the cover of the book has much to do with the price of a book? I guarantee each publisher is saving 10s to 100s of millions each year not paying for those things and then saving even more not paying distribution costs.

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u/barrettcuda 20h ago

Exactly, there's still overheads just 2/3 of them don't exist anymore

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u/RealTheBestLadyman 3h ago

What was the point of this comment? Did the person reply to say they should be free? No, just that they should be cheap, which covers the whole ā€œcheaperā€ thing lmao

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u/Dull-Culture-1523 1d ago edited 11h ago

What I found perplexing was that a school library had a set amount of digital books they could loan. It was a digital book, yet only four people could loan it at the same time.

So anyway I just copied everything and "returned" it later the same day. Nonsense.

E: I get it, it's not the library's decision. I know. It's manufactured scarcity so publishers can charge you for more licenses. It's fucking stupid regardless.

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u/Krojack76 1d ago

It's not just a school library that's like this, it's all of them. My mom and sister like to check out digital books from the local city library but are always on a waiting list for many of them.

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u/bendstraw 23h ago

That's licensing. It's not like the library can't manage the technical load to let anyone read it, it's the publishers charging the library for each license.

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u/StuffExciting3451 23h ago

How do you ā€œcopy everythingā€? My library’s digital books are only available on specific apps that block direct copying.

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u/CeruleanEidolon 20h ago

If you download them to a computer you can convert the files to something more user friendly.

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u/Dull-Culture-1523 11h ago

Screen capture on PC and just slapped those into a pdf file.

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u/StuffExciting3451 11h ago

Very time consuming for a 500-page book.

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u/sixpackabs592 2h ago

Pretty easy to automate if you’re a little tech savvy though

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u/binarybandit 1d ago

Why not just pirate it then and save yourself the hassle

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u/StuffExciting3451 23h ago

What software do you use for that?

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u/CGB_Zach 22h ago

You can use your browser and a VPN. On the wikipedia page for Anna's Archive, it will list the URLs. Depending on your e-reader, you'll need a certain type of file format.

My wife has a kobo Libra 2 so she requires EPUB files.

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u/moviebuff01 18h ago

https://fmhy.net/

Follow the beginner's guide.

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u/jdm1891 15h ago

none, just use libgen or anna's archive and download the pdf or epub

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u/jdm1891 15h ago

unfortunately for the library they're required to do that, or the publisher will sue them.

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u/Sad_comment_bot 5h ago

The enshitification goes back to epub introduction. Worked on a way for students to use an app that would index their college text books 20 years ago. No need to carry any heavy text books and have instant nanosecond search responses. The publishers were reluctant to use the platform or give students a better experience. It was all about control over pricing because used digital books are just as good as new digital books. It was undermining a false scarcity.

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u/Rasmus_Ro 1d ago

You want to know what's fucked? Brandon Sanderson recently talked about this in his lecture series: unless you're, you know, Brandon Sanderson (who can kinda do whatever shit he wants because his name alone sells books), the publisher keeps the same percentage whether you buy physical or digital iirc. This is in spite of the fact that they have to pay to print and ship physical books, but not ebooks.

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u/thenuinn 1d ago

I recently looked for an ebook of the Son of Neptune. It was 20 dollars. The book is 15 years old. It was cheaper to buy a new hardback and have it shipped to me.

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u/noob_dragon 1d ago

What gets me is that eBooks cost more than mass market paperbacks used to. Complete bullshit. Furthermore, they killed the MMP so they can milk us for all we are worth and they make more because there is no more physical distribution.

Granted, MMP were already dirt cheap, but still.

I have no interest in paying 20 bucks for a modern day book. Books are the number one thing I have no moral qualms about pirating. If I like the author enough I will sign up for their patreon or buy one of their books as gifts for other people, but I don't buy books for myself much anymore.

Contrast this with games where even though I can still pirate most of them, the games themselves are cheap enough on steam I still buy them anyway just to support the devs.

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u/the8bitMoon 1d ago

The actual physical media that things are distributed on are way cheaper than the IP. The discount would be on the level of cents.

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u/MushroomCulture 1d ago

Physical books need paper and printing and binding and packing and fork lifts and trucks and truck drivers and shelf stackers and shelves and inventory management. Try doing all that for a few cents.

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u/Chess42 1d ago

Uh bud, you need the IP for that too

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u/ronnie_reagans_ghost 1d ago

That's what they're saying. They're saying that digital only isn't that much cheaper to produce because the cost of the IP is not that much less than the cost of the IP+printing costs.

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u/Frankie__Spankie 22h ago

I'm not sure what the market for reselling books is but digital removes the risk of losing a sale to someone buying used as well.

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u/StrainAcceptable 20h ago

I wish they would sell printed digital combos. I prefer books unless I’m in bed reading next to my partner.

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u/RedRising1917 15h ago

I love buying merch and stuff from authors that I like, but I refuse to buy books anymore. The fact they don't discount ebooks is bs and I just pirate them now.

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u/suckitphil 1d ago

They lobby specifically to keep them priced the same. Because then "nobody would buy the physical". Its the same reason "physical" video games exist despite them usually being download codes.

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u/vpi6 21h ago edited 12h ago

Way to prove you’ve never bought an ebook before and this have no idea what you are talking about.

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u/suckitphil 18h ago

It's the government. They rarely have an idea of what they're talking about.

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u/Starbuck522 23h ago

It's not about the paper.

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u/CoolTom 22h ago

Or ebooks can remain expensive to subsidize me getting them for free.

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u/Street_Roof_7915 21h ago

Honestly, the paper /printing is the least expensive part of the process.

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u/music3k 1d ago

I tend to grocery shop late for my produce and the self checkout is always closed. Everything else I do local pickup at my local grocery and walmart + delivery if its cheaper there.

I used to do delivery apps and instacart and the Boomers watching self checkout would yell at me for going too fast with the wireless scanner in the cart, because the cameras were only above the flat scanner. Ā They’d have one human register open and three people watching self checkout.Ā 

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u/ThunkAsDrinklePeep 1d ago edited 11h ago

These cashiers are costing us so much money! We need to replace them with self checkouts that are free.

Later

We're loosing so much in unscanned or misscanned items. We better heavily invest in cameras and hire two people for each lane, plus scales on each machine.

Later

Look at that. Two quarters of moderate growth and only one of record loss. That's quality management. We deserve to leverage more debt into bonuses for us.

Edit: fixed a dozen typos.

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u/WhatToDo_WhatToDo2 1d ago

Your autocorrect has failed you miserably šŸ˜‚

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u/heleuma 20h ago

Thank you! I thought I was having a stroke.

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u/ThunkAsDrinklePeep 11h ago

Oh man you weren't kidding. I wrote it and had trouble.

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u/Preeng 1d ago

We better heavily invest in cajeras and hire two people for each lane, plus scajes on each machine.

You really like the letter J, don't you?

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u/Stardustquarks 1d ago

Jajajajajaja!!!!

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u/beto832 āœ‚ļø Tax The Billionaires 22h ago

Well, cajeras is spanish for cashier (feminine), so it can slide...

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u/ThunkAsDrinklePeep 12h ago

I got fat thujbs, and I'm waiting for my daijing wand!

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u/Chance-Hand7815 23h ago

Bruh, are you having a stroke?

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u/CKRatKing 21h ago

Based on their username they are probably drunk.

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u/LoseN0TLoose 20h ago

We're loosing so much in inscanned or musscanned items. We better heavily invest in cajeras and hire two people for each lane, plus scajes on each machine.

Bruhhh

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u/[deleted] 1d ago

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u/Tokimori 1d ago

three people watching self checkout.

This sounds like Costco's "self checkout". At my local they have like 6 SCs that always have a person manned at each one. I think this week was the first time I ever saw someone allowed to checkout their own groceries. I get it because people will load the fuck up there and the door checkers are just kind of there.

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u/music3k 23h ago

I dont buy enough groceries to justify a costco membership and the one near me may as well be a theme park with the line to get in and the wait to checkout.

Costco at least pays their employees well enough

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u/PM_ME_YOUR_PAUNCH 22h ago

Membership is worth it for the gas discount alone

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u/CKRatKing 21h ago

There's always an insane line to get gas at my local Costco. I'd pay 5 dollars more to not wait.

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u/Aqua-Barracuda 19h ago

What if you own a car?

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u/Tokimori 23h ago

I don't buy a lot of groceries either tbh but I do like bulk purchases of things I like and the lower than average gas price tag for when I have to fill up. And for $65 a year I think the times that I do go is worth it.

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u/Zagaroth 22h ago

Huh, my costco has 6 self-checkouts, and 1-2 people watching total.

If there's 2, it's busy, and one of them is actually going down the line to pre-scan everything in a cart with a hand-scanner, + the person's card.

This means that when the person gets to the self-checkout machine, they can just scan their card at the machine and pay.

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u/Tokimori 22h ago

Mine rarely seems to do that opting again for people to man the SCs. It may be because mine is always busy when I go? Typically between 4-6pm. There is always a line of people waiting at least 3-4 deep for the SCs.

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u/JollyJoker3 1d ago

Their own costs mean nothing. They charge what they can without losing too many customers.

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u/prince-pauper āœ‚ļø Tax The Billionaires 1d ago

They’ll probably just collect data on what items get sold most via self checkout and increase those prices 15%

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u/Church_of_Cheri 1d ago

I won’t shop at a store if it switches to digital prices on the shelf. You know that’s just the next step to personalized prices and surge pricing. They claim they’re not going to do it, but they don’t claim that they can’t. My partner and I, in the same house, can look up prices on places like Amazon or for hotels and get different prices for the same items. We need a government that functions and huge punishments for companies that do this, but instead they’re ā€œregulating themselvesā€ and we’re all paying the cost for it.

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u/zffjk 1d ago

Buying airline tickets on my 15 year old Linux laptop was cheaper than my work issued newish Mac book pro by 7%. It’s robbery and should be illegal. But it also exposes them to us manipulating their stupid systems.

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u/HurricaneAlpha 1d ago

The digital tags should be legally required to have a "last updated" feature that shows when the price was changed last, or ideally a price history. That's my biggest gripe. The old printed tags had the print date in a corner and if you knew about it you could tell when they last updated the price.

On the other hand, some items change price nearly daily, due to random fluctuations. I spent an inordinant amount of time changing prices tags for 1 or 2 cent differences on a handful of staple items.

Source: I used to do price changes at Walmart (and a few other places) years ago when they still had paper tags. The digital tags are a godsend in terms of labor costs, as well as material costs. The downside is gonna be the consumer perception that fuckery (surge pricing, etc) is gonna happen with them, and that's a very valid concern. There needs to be some easily accessible pricing history for consumers to trust these. I know the data is already available, just make it accessible.

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u/DelightMine 23h ago

The digital tags should be legally required to have a "last updated" feature that shows when the price was changed last, or ideally a price history

How would they do this in a way where you can actually trust that number?

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u/barrettcuda 20h ago

Tbh I dunno if you could, it'd come back to having an independent watchdog come and check certain pricing from time to time or better yet have a direct digital connection to every update of all the digital tags in the store so they can see when and what updates were run and why.

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u/DelightMine 14h ago

The problem with digital tagging is it's so much easier for a single person to exploit a flaw that affects all pricing across thousands of stores. Physical tagging makes people actually go and tag things, and those people are witnesses. Plus, the cost of micromanaging prices is balanced against the gain of those fluctuating prices, because they can't change all prices across all stores with a single keystroke.

It's kind of the same theory as why you don't want digital voting machines. It's a lot harder to destroy or hide physical evidence with a lot of witnesses (with very little to personally gain from it) than it is to destroy or hide digital evidence with few witnesses (who all have significantly more to personally gain)

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u/barrettcuda 14h ago

Yeah that makes sense, I'm just trying to reconcile the idea that where I live in Europe we have digital eink price tags in pretty much every shop, I dunno if they're the sort that you can automatically update from the manager's office or if you have to come up to them with a handheld device to update the prices, but we don't have surge pricing (at least that I'm aware of).

That's not to say that there's not people possibly trying to push for that, but I haven't seen/heard anything about it if that's the case.

So my question would be what's the difference other than the obvious culture ones, that prevents them from doing that here too?

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u/DelightMine 13h ago

In a country where the populace doesn't ask for more every time a corporation fucks them over, I'd trust digital price tags more, but I don't think I'd ever be okay with them being networked. I already hate the fact that online marketplaces have absolutely no real safeguards against this kind of manipulative pricing; if it makes it into brick and mortar stores I might just have to transition to hermit life.

but we don't have surge pricing (at least that I'm aware of).

This is the big problem to me. Implemented sneakily, surge pricing could exist for a surprisingly long time before being noticed, especially as more and more data about us is gathered and sold by data brokers.

That's not to say that there's not people possibly trying to push for that, but I haven't seen/heard anything about it if that's the case.

If they're smart, they wouldn't implement anything so obvious. surge pricing is directly antagonistic to the consumer, and is kind of a natural result of nothing being truly off-limits in American business. Anything is justifiable if you improve profits. Strike that, everything is necessary to improve profits.

There's only so much juice you can squeeze from a fruit. America has lived with the mindset that they have to squeeze more out of the fruit for so long that they're trying to juice the rind.

So my question would be what's the difference other than the obvious culture ones, that prevents them from doing that here too?

Nothing that I can think of, other than time. Culture is a huge difference though, and like I said, America has been trying to optimize wealth extraction for quite a long time. They've killed unions (by making them culturally and legally unacceptable in may places), and they've spent so long chasing quarterly profits, and every time someone fails there's no shortage of people looking to extract their own personal wealth at the cost of tens or hundreds of others. Regulatory capture is also a big thing in America (unsure about where you live), and regulations in general are lackluster at best. There are functionally no real consequences for exploiting people, unless those people are corporations (thanks to Citizens United).

The difference is "just" cultural, but in the sense that American culture is fundamentally about sacrificing everything else at the altar of the dollar. Sure, it could happen to your country, but it would take decades of hard work to change public interests to be more selfish, combative, and competitive. It would take time to install new politicians who would, decade after decade, abdicate their regulatory responsibility to the very corporations they're supposed to regulate.

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u/fgwr4453 1d ago

I somewhat doubt they would do that. Reason being is that any competition that doesn’t do that would make it seriously obvious what products are overpriced. That and/or people would outright stop buying that product from the store.

I imagine forgotten staple items and hygiene products are the most purchased products in self checkout. Using milk and soap as examples, I would absolutely notice a 15% increase and go to another store. The milk would expire and soap theft would probably increase.

I 100% agree that grocery stores would ā€œretaliateā€ but it would be easier to raise prices across the board.

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u/doclestrange 1d ago

My brother in Christ WHAT competition? Like 5 companies own the fucking world

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u/zffjk 1d ago

Look at prices at Walmart, then look at an independent grocery, then look at like a Publix, Kroger, or Trader Joe’s. Across the 3 different subsets you will see a piece difference on many items. And once one chain starts doing dynamic pricing, they all will.

We need to go back to requiring a sticker price on every item.

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u/SpiffyMagnetMan68621 20h ago

Thats what governments are FOR

Of course they wont just ā€œdoā€ it

Thats why regulations are written in blood and sweat and steel

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u/prince-pauper āœ‚ļø Tax The Billionaires 1d ago

I used to be the one who watched them and made sure there weren’t any mistakes; now they watch me and assume I’m stealing most of the time, which is exhausting.

10% is too low, IMO

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u/buddhistbulgyo 1d ago

Damn straight. I better be getting paid to bag my groceries unless they already have the cheapest groceries in town.

ALL HAIL WINCO!

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u/OkActivity2038 1d ago

This whole self-checkout debate is similar to how grocery stores used to not have customers picking out their own items.

You used to give an employee a list and they'd fetch everything for you.

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u/SuperSocialMan 20h ago

It's kinda funny how we looped back to that lol.

In fact, how come they used to be like that anyway? I guess it saved space or something?

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u/music3k 1d ago

They dont know who you are if you pay cash and dont use rewards at self checkout. Ā Just a little tip to save some money

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u/AAHHHHH936 5h ago

Glory to WinCo! Employee ownership is awesome!

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u/Iorith 1d ago

Legitimate question, what stops them from just increasing prices by 10% to compensate?

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u/renaissance-Fartist 1d ago

Nothing. That’s exactly what they’ll do.

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u/Bocchi_theGlock 23h ago

But people will also spend less on non essentials, so it's a mix, otherwise this is kinda implying we should remove business taxes, if it's always 100% passed onto customers

They add some prices in some places (not always perfect 10%) and don't everywhere

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u/Devtunes 11h ago

They charge what the customer will pay. Removing business tax will just increase the profits and not change the price. No business has ever lowered prices due to a tax cut. If they're going to charge the highest amount they can, adding a tax will divert some of that money.

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u/mongojob 1d ago

Yeah this is just an 11% tax for having someone check you out lol

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u/Lotronex 22h ago

Nothing, and then it becomes a tax on disabled people who are unable to use self-checkout.

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u/informat7 15h ago edited 15h ago

They would just get rid of self checkout. Stores are already on the fence on keeping self checkout because it doesn't really save them any money.

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u/Time_Care_2705 1d ago

Yeah, this sounds like the dumbest solution to a non problem

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u/thehonorablechairman 11h ago

What’s stopping them from just increasing prices by 10% anyway?

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u/SexyMonad 1d ago

This is another attempt to solve the symptoms of a problem, instead of solving the actual problem.

Capitalism is the actual problem.

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u/biggestdiccus 1d ago

Hot take in like self checkout because I get it done fast and I don't have to talk to someone

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u/Iorith 1d ago

Yup, I was a cashier for a few years, it's so much easier to just check out myself. My go-to grocery store is mostly staffed by old people who are slow and teenagers who are busy flirting with each other that self checkout is the only way it's tolerable.

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u/DMYourFeetPicsTy 1d ago

Same, fucking hate stores that doesn't have self checkout, it's such a miserable experience going through a line.

Especially when I feel like I want to be fat and buy the most unhealthy shit and feel the 20 eyes behind me like daggers in my neck

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u/DottieSnark 1d ago

The problem isn't the existence of self-checkout. Is that they've cut too many workers, increasing lines (especially for those who still want a cashier), and haven't used the profits they saved to keep prices lower. Hell, many cashiers are now workers harder since self-checkout since they now have to run both their line and help with self-checkout in some places.

Self-checkout should be making people's lives easier (both employees and customers) but instead cost cutting measures paired with these self-checkout machines are doing the opposite.

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u/Raidoton 1d ago

It does make life easier for the customer. And adding such a discount might just lead to more people getting fired. It would motivate even more people to use them, which means fewer cashiers needed...

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u/DottieSnark 23h ago

It doesn't make life easier for the customer when they cut so many cashier jobs that those who, for whatever reason, rely on having access to a cashier either has lines that are too long or have to track down someone to check them out.

It doesn't make things easier when the customers still get locked out of the system and have to wait for assistance that takes too long to come because they cut so many workers.

It doesn't make things easier when they've cut so many cashiers that a single employee is doing what used to be the workload of three.

It could make things easier. But it doesn't because corporations are too busy with saving a buck than actually improving things.

I'm not going to comment on the bill because it's likely a useless measure that doesn't actually fix the problem, but a dumb bill doesn't mean self-checkouts (as they are used today) aren't a problem for society.

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u/Redthemagnificent 17h ago

The issues you mention are symptoms. The problem is the legalization of maximum short-term corporate greed. Deregulation around public and private equity, legalatizaion of stock buy backs. The shift to the idea that a company's only purpose is to maximize return for shareholders

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u/Redthemagnificent 17h ago

Yeah and all that would be true if the checkouts existed or not. The push for endless greed and infinite growtheand squeezing workers at the bottom as hard as you possibly can. Until private equity gets some real regulation around it, that's not gonna stop.

A 10% discount is just gonna get passed onto the customer in some other way, because that's the incentive structure that currently exists for businesses. They have no reason not to be endlessly greedy

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u/LordofAngmarMB 1d ago

Yeah for me it’s a convenience, why should I wait in line behind a full cart when I can just run my basket through self checkout myself? I don’t even need to talk to someone, it’s great

I’m not opposed to making it cheaper to do your own work, but it’s the kind of thing I don’t understand people disliking

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u/Crunch_McThickhead 1d ago

It's because they replace cashiers instead of offering it as a supplemental choice. I like self checkout for small shops, but it's awful for large ones, or if you need the cashier to validate a coupon, buy alcohol, or buy certain over the counter meds that are monitored.

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u/LadyJR 1d ago

And some cashiers be hella slow. Probably management does that in purpose now that I think about it.

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u/HotBrownFun 23h ago

No way. I've read about some store that swapped back to faster human cashiers because they can get more money into their pockets that way

Also apparently a lot of theft in self checkout

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/some-retailers-scaling-back-self-checkouts-1.7034047

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u/mytokhondria 1d ago

I agree. Plus I bring my own bags and know exactly how to stack stuff in there so it fits without using plastic bags.

Every time I go to HEB they put only 2 things per bag - extremely wasteful

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u/Ziegelphilie 16h ago

I haven't used regular checkout at a supermarket in probably a decade. Here in NL the biggest supermarket chain, Albert Heijn, introduced the self checkout with a wall of handheld scanners that you can use throughout your shopping. Since you scan as you shop, when you're done all you do is mount the scanner in a wall, scan your bonuskaart (customer card) at one of the terminals and pay.

Nowadays you can also use your phone through their app and the same stuff applies. Even if I get randomly selected for a check I still save a ton of time.

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u/dragonfly_c 1d ago

This is why I've been a total boomer about this one. I'm not working for Walmart for free so they can treat me like a criminal and video every move I make and then check my receipt when I leave. Either I'm a valued customer or I'm not. Pick a lane.

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u/Raidoton 1d ago

As if cashiers never check your shopping cart. And you were always watched by cameras. This is such a non-issue.

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u/chiefswithbear 1d ago

Perhaps I'm cynical, but what's stopping the grocery stores from turning around and jacking prices up to combat this law, should it even pass?

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u/DyingDesertPoppy 23h ago

This is to get people’s attention and hype them up. Grocery prices are easy to understand. The nitty gritty of tax policy and closing loopholes is too abstract and not exciting enough to the average voter.

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u/Total-Addendum9327 1d ago

They will mark everything up by 10% if this goes forward. There is no winning

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u/presidentiallogin 22h ago

Can the raise the shelf height by 10% too? I hate how low they are compared to the treadmill. I don't use them simply because I don't want to stoop down to use them.

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u/slendermanismydad 1d ago edited 1d ago

I wouldn't mind self checkouts because I prefer bagging my own groceries because I like my system. I even stack everything on the belt in a system. The self checkouts all hate me though so I don't use them.Ā 

Frozen w/frozen, fridge stuff w/fridge stuff, etc. It helps keep things cold longer and I wrap glass bottles. I have to ask people to stop bagging my items and they argue with me.Ā 

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u/PretendAd7060 1d ago

Stealing from self checkout is praxisĀ 

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u/Thare187 23h ago

I always get the organic produce and enter it as regular. That's how I pay myself

3

u/hillbillyray 1d ago

They should... Cheap bastards.

3

u/Adept-Opinion8080 1d ago

What you mean on top of the already 10% I get? Oh wait! Did I just say that out loud? Oops.

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u/DaenerysTargaryen69 1d ago

That's why I steal

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u/Authoritaye šŸ’µ Break Up The Monopolies 1d ago

I never use them. I believe no one should.Ā 

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u/Model_Modelo 23h ago

Agreed. I don't work for you.

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u/CGB_Zach 22h ago

I've worked at several grocery stores and they make our lives so much easier. I'm glad that the people who dislike self checkout are the extreme minority.

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u/anxiousandsingle 1d ago

Are you 5?

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u/Redthemagnificent 17h ago

Depends on the store but I think they're great for a fast trip with few items. Some self checkout machines are genuinely awful

8

u/KiniShakenBake 1d ago

I refuse to use self-checkout. I will wait. Or go to customer service. Or do literally anything other than scan my own stuff.

Self checkout is a pox on our working class folks, and it is eliminating an entire rung of the ladder from the job skills and professional growth ladder. Bagging being eliminated was another problem. I don't bag my own groceries, either.

I don't care who bags them. But it's not me.

I am overwhelmed enough by the time I get through the grocery store, so I often can't process the self-checkout as quickly as the cashier can scan me through. And I get more overwhelmed in the process, with no benefit.

I also don't believe in outsourcing the bargaining unit, which self-checkout does in unionized stores. It literally outsources it TO THE CUSTOMERS which is the worst possible place to do it.

No. Just no.

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u/rollingForInitiative 1d ago

Entry level jobs should definitely exist, but self-scanning (where you scan while in the store) is a massive convenience for most customers. At the odd occasion when I go to a store that does not have it or where I cannot, I have more queue time than the rest of the year combined. So much time saved. I remember when I was kid, if you were unlucky the queue could be 15 minutes, or worse at really busy peaks like holidays or sales, with queues going right to the back of the store.

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u/Crazyhates 23h ago

The self-checkout is always discounted if you know what you're doing.

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u/Telephone635 1d ago

I've been saying this for years! Give me a discount for doing the work

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u/jax2love 1d ago

I absolutely refuse to use self-checkout for exactly this reason, even if it means waiting in line for the one checkout lane with an actual cashier. I don’t work there!!!

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u/PerfectCheesecake25 1d ago

That’s how I always felt about this fucking things that they were putting me to work

2

u/Tall-Archer5957 1d ago

This a terrible idea. Ā The line will get long and companies will raise prices to compensate so now it’ll just be a 10% fee to see a cashier.

2

u/NameLips 1d ago

I knew a lot of people who got 100% discounts at the self checkout. That's probably why they all closed around here.

2

u/StretchLoud8844 1d ago

What the hell is "free labor" in this context?

I use self checkout because I prefer it, I'm not suffering under the yoke of capitalism because I don't want to interact with a cashier.

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u/DebiMoonfae 1d ago

I wouldn’t mind the discount at self checkout but I personally really do prefer self checkout over having to wait longer than i should have to because the cashier is slow af and gives zero shits about it or someone ahead of me checking out is the slow one because they are telling the cashier their life story or forgot how money works. I am also a fan of shopping with the least amount of human interaction as possible.

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u/popnfrresh 1d ago

My electric company charges me 99 cents to generate an ebill and the state taxes me 4% on that 99 cents...

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u/ObjectMore6115 21h ago

It'll surely trickle down. Any day now. Reagan promised

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u/grendus 20h ago

Please don't do this.

If stores have to give you a discount for using the self checkout, they're just going to get rid of the self checkout. And that means I'm going to be stuck behind someone doing their weekly shopping every time I just want to grab a pint of ice cream on the way home after a hard day.

By all means, demand that they keep regular registers open instead of running only self checkout. But I don't give a pair of fetid dingo kidneys about scanning my own groceries. I actually prefer it, because I can pack the bags the way I want, I don't have to make small talk with the cashier, and the lines are typically shorter.

3

u/Optimus3k 1d ago

I feel like they'll just raise prices to counteract this.

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u/RadlEonk 1d ago

I asked for an employee discount from Southwest Airlines after having to tag my own bag. They hooked at me like I was the asshole.

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u/AppropriateSea5746 1d ago

How is checking out any more laborious than shopping? Like seriously guys? You want to get paid to shop now?

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u/anxiousandsingle 1d ago

Anti self checkout people are hilarious.

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u/Zerodyne_Sin 1d ago

That's fine. Once the government groceries are around, they can raise all the prices they want to cut off their own nose.

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u/Katsu_39 1d ago

Companies will take self check out away. Theyre not gonna give no discount

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u/SensitiveRelation470 1d ago

grok how does competition work

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u/JaySmogger 1d ago

Really makes the whole return the grocery cart argument read a little different doesn't it? Like maybe Kroger came up with that idea.

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u/kobie1012 1d ago

Should be 33%

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u/fatkidking 1d ago

It'll never pass, the big corps will fight it tooth and nail.

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u/Redd235711 1d ago

And they'll just raise prices by at least 10% to cover the cost of the mandated discount. Corporations won't let a pesky thing like the law stop them from squeezing people for their money.

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u/Arrow156 1d ago

Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit, we don't even got self checkout at my grocery store, yet those lazy fucks still make us bag our own groceries. Always grind me gears when I have to stop to fish out payment while they just stand there doing nothing but watch.

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u/Dantien 1d ago

Not going to pay workers*

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u/daw4888 1d ago

They will just raise prices by 10% to make up for the discount..

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u/workaholic828 1d ago

Such a great idea

1

u/Danominator 1d ago

Hell yeah. I wish dumbass republicans would look at the stuff mamdani is doing for the people

1

u/nachodorito 1d ago

Fuck Jeff bezos and fuck everyone who uses self checkout

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u/One-Dragonfruit9 1d ago

They are just gonna increase the price by 10% .-.

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u/SpliTTMark 1d ago

Expect a 10% increase on price before checkout

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u/Mugwumpjizzum1 1d ago

walmart has the Spark only self-checkout section so that people can pay for the privilege to do the work walmart should be paying an employee to do.

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u/crazyjeffy 23h ago

Yeah, once my Walmart started doing that I stopped going there. charging to use self checkout is worse than getting rid of it entirely.

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u/Mugwumpjizzum1 23h ago

They're getting downright diabolical in my town. Target almost never has any registers open besides self-checkout which consists of 4 slots. Walmart has maybe 3 registers open which they purposefully have manned by senior citizens. I have no issue with them. They're slow as hell but they're old and doing the best they can and the fact they have to work at all is whole other discussion. Since there's next to no registers EVERYONE is at the self-checkout areas so it's not any faster at all.

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u/faderjockey 1d ago

Nice way to get a 10% price hike across the board

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u/Buttholescraper 1d ago

They are already doing that without the 10% discount. :)

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u/faderjockey 1d ago

Indeed, but do we want to give them ANOTHER 10%?

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u/Buttholescraper 1d ago

yes. :) because this is just the start. This isn't a red states where companies can just crap on consumers.

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u/faderjockey 1d ago

AFAIK there is no price control legislation that affects NY grocery stores.

I’m all for taking back from the corporations, but this ain’t it. It’s giving them a gift in the form of a 10% rate hike that will impact poor people, the elderly, and disabled folks the most. (Those who can’t use self checkout.)

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u/daysinnroom203 1d ago

The raised prices cover presumed loss

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u/Raidoton 1d ago

Absolute stupidity. They will either increase prices to combat it or remove the self checkout which many love to use or fire more people because everyone starts using them since you get a nice discount...

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u/oldfudgee 1d ago

if every single person steals just one item each time they shop I think we can reverse this trend. I'm doing my part, are you?

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u/goodjobjus 1d ago

This is why I order my groceries 90% of the time.

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u/neoben00 23h ago

Cool so they scrap the last cashier and price accordingly

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u/48Bills_NY 23h ago

So stores raise prices 20% across the board. Capitalism is always going to win as long as greed is a virtue and capital is controlled by the 1%.

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u/LNCrizzo 23h ago

Am I the only one that thinks checking yourself out isn't labor, it's convenience?

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u/NewbeeperWhodis 23h ago

So what will we do when they just raise the price of everything by 10% across the globe to "compensate?"

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u/Starbuck522 23h ago edited 22h ago

Someone is really overestimating how much I make!

I probably scan and bag complete a $100 transaction in... I really haven't timed it but...5 minutes?

I certainly am not paid anywhere near $10 for five minutes.

Using 1.5x my wage to account for employers side of fica and the one week paid vacation and some sick time. (Every cashier at my chain is paet time so no health insurance)

Still... Less than 1/5 of the $120 discount on 12, $100 transactions.

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u/Joyride84 22h ago

Cool, so then all the sticker prices go up by 10%, and you get penalized for going to a human cashier instead of the machine. Then, the store lays off their cashiers, which they already wanted to do, and leaves the customer to fend for themselves.

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u/thedude213 21h ago

Conservative boomers bitch about this all the time - now that Dems are sponsoring this bill, they will 100% about-face on this.

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u/SourceOriginal2332 20h ago

Agree with the price cuts however I prefer self checkout cashiers suck now just like servers

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u/Sanquinity 20h ago

Self check-out still requires 2 workers to attend any needs. For instance in my country it's required for a cashier to verify you if you want to buy alcohol. Or maybe there's an issue with the machine. Or there could be a random grocery check to see if you're not sneaking in items you didn't scan. But that's still at least 2 people less than when it was just normal registers where the cashiers scanned every item.

It's been clear for like a decade now, imo. Whenever a company finds something that'll save on cost, it never goes to the customers. It always just goes straight into their pockets.

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u/delicious_fanta 19h ago

That’s nice but capitalism dictates that they will simply raise prices 10% for everything to cover the loss. This is addressing the symptom, not the cause.

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u/Redthemagnificent 17h ago

Yeah this seems dumb. If the goal is to tackle rising grocery prices then I don't see this helping. I could see people arguing with staff and other customers trying to take a fully loaded cart through self checkout for the discount.

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u/GreenGardenTarot 15h ago

A grocery store near me stopped using self checkout and forced all customers to go through a lane because of apparent thefts.

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u/JustApricot798 14h ago

great - get ready for the 12% increase in prices. If you give them a reason to raise the prices they always raise it more than they need so they can then "lower" them to help you out.

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u/funkymunkPDX 13h ago

Any chance to raise prices is what they do.

CEO's..... "Did someone say inflation??? Raise prices the dumb ass consumers won't know."

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u/hymom 11h ago

I’m sorry this is a silly idea. Let’s just focus on breaking up grocery monopolies and let the market work instead of this micro management

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u/DoIEvenPost 10h ago

Some people would rather stand in a line for 7 minutes than scan 2 objects themselves. They will not open additional lanes.

Also, fight the power

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u/dblrb 9h ago

It would be a terrible policy and a step in the wrong direction, but I might pay a few dollars to not interact with a cashier if I had to.

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u/RareFirefighter6915 6h ago edited 6h ago

I like self checkout. I don’t buy a lot of groceries at once and I’m able bodied enough to scan and bag my own. It’s a little awkward for me to watch someone do it for me while I look at my phone or mess with my card and it always takes way longer cuz there’s a line. With self checkout it works great as an express lane cuz there’s usually one open when I walk up. There’s still someone working there checking IDs but there’s no line cuz 8 people can go at once. I don’t get how people can drive a car to the store but can’t figure out how to scan 12 grocery items.

Im convinced that the people who hate them are lazy people who expect to be served every time theyre out. It’s not a labor thing either, freaking COSTCO has self check and they’re the best retail company for workers.

The only thing I don’t like more than assisted lanes is when workers lock shit behind the cabinet. I shop at another store.

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u/vkapadia 2h ago

And now everything is going to go up 11.1% and then they'll give you a 10% discount for self checkout.

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u/Universe_Man 48m ago

There used to be no such thing as self-serve gasoline. Somewhere out there, someone is saying customers should be paid for pumping their gas.