Technology has a way of both making life radically more convenient and upsetting organized labor. This has always been the case. A case in point is California’s perpetual war on self-service machines at grocery stores.
There are many problems in this state. Poverty, homelessness, crime, poor quality infrastructure, high cost-of-living, underperforming public schools, and so on.
Despite this, Sacramento politicians, in league with their union bosses, have spent the last couple of years contemplating how to interfere with self-checkout machines in grocery stores through the legislative process.
Last year, Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas introduced Senate Bill 1446 to micromanage how stores utilize self-checkout machines. The bill was sponsored by the California Labor Federation and United Food and Commercial Workers, Western States Council.
As the Assembly Appropriations bill analysis explained, this includes, “[Prohibiting] a retail store from providing a self-service checkout option unless certain workplace conditions are met, such as adopting a policy to limit self-service purchases to no more than 15 items, having one employee monitor no more than two self-service stations while relieved of all other duties, and including self-service checkout in the employer’s illness and prevention program required by the Division of Occupational Safety and Health.”
The bill cleared the state Senate before dying in the Assembly. But now it’s back, by the same senator with the same sponsors, under Senate Bill 442.
The bill is back with some reworked requirements, including, as explained by the Assembly Appropriations Committee, “[Requiring] a retail store that intends to implement self-checkout to notify workers and workers’ collective bargaining representatives in writing at least 60 days in advance of implementing the practice.”
It also, “Requires a retail store that offers self-service checkout to include the practice in the employer’s analysis of potential work hazards under the illness and prevention program (IIP) required by the Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA).”
Do self-checkout machines really demand this level of scrutiny and state regulation? Do politicians have any idea how to run a grocery store?
“This seems like a clear example of why Californians pay the highest prices for groceries, regardless of what checkout line they go through,” said Daniel Conway, a lobbyist for the California Grocers Association, according to CalMatters.
Indeed.
Successful grocers know how to manage their operations and how to integrate technology into their operations. Not every little thing requires a law.