--- title: "Robots Are Coming for Service Jobs" description: "Automation is eating into food and hospitality jobs. Unions are demanding measures that will protect staff from being replaced by robots." date: "2018-09-27" modified: "2018-09-27" authors: - name: "Jon Christian" job_title: "Executive Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jonc" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/service-robots" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Robotics" - "Robots and Machines" tags: - "henna na" - "marriott international" - "McDonald's" - "service jobs" - "service robots" - "spyce" - "the digest" --- # Robots Are Coming for Service Jobs ![Automation is eating into food and hospitality jobs. Unions are demanding measures that will protect staff from being replaced by robots.]() *\Image: Marriott/Victor Tangermann\* ## JOB THIEF First came the factories. Between 1993 and 2007, as U.S. factories became highly automated, every new robot eliminated 5.6 human jobs, an economic think tank estimated in [a study](). Now automation is starting to eat into a new industry: food and hospitality. Workers are concerned — according to the *New York Times,* the labor union that represents Marriott International hotel workers is [demanding measures]() that will protect staff from being replaced by robots. ## ROBO-STOP The *Times'* take is that food and hospitality jobs have been spared by automation because service workers make so little. But cheap, effective artificial intelligence means those jobs are no longer secure. Especially worrying to Marriott workers: Their employer is now deploying Amazon Echo speakers in rooms, which they worry will cut into the duties of human hotel workers. And it's not just Marriott. Fast food giant McDonald's is [rolling out]() cashier-replacing kiosks at 1,000 stores per quarter, which one former executive [blamed on workers' demands]() for higher wages. This spring, Las Vegas food workers [voted to strike]() to protest technology they said was encroaching on human jobs in kitchens. ## BURGER FLIPPERS Robots haven't pushed out the human bellhops or front desk workers quite yet. But [experts predict]() that's going to change radically. And we've already got examples of what the service sector will look like as robots shoulder more tasks, from the Boston-based [automated kitchen Spyce]() to the [Japanese "robot hotel" Henna na](). So buckle up. Automation is going to bring precipitous change to the job market — and if history is any guide, workers are unlikely to give up their jobs without a fight. **READ MORE:** Hotel Workers Fret Over a New Rival: Alexa at the Front Desk \[[*New York Times*]()\] ***More on automation and labor: [Las Vegas Food Service Workers Are Going on Strike So They Don’t Lose Their Jobs to Robots]()*** ## Author I'm responsible for editing, assigning, and scouting at Futurism, as well as occasionally writing for the site. That work involves keeping an eye on a wide range of narratives and issues, but over the past few years I've become increasingly interested in how AI is shaping the future of media, the web, and information itself. My day-to-day often involves collaborating on reporting and commentary projects bylined by my colleagues, but I try to find time to do my own reporting as well; stories I've broken for Futurism have been cited by publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Wired, Ars Technica, New York Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, Bloomberg, and more. I grew up in Southern Vermont and attended Vanderbilt University. Prior to Futurism, I contributed to outlets including the Boston Globe, Vice, Wired, Slate, the Atlantic, the Outline, Ars Technica and more, and did stints in farming and food service. I currently live in Brooklyn, New York, and in my free time I enjoy pinball, word games, cycling, running, and music production. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()