Why I don’t feel guilty about scanning my own groceries and you shouldn’t either
I am now officially sick and tired of all the people out there trying to guilt me into not scanning my own groceries at the supermarket.
You see it all the time on social media, like this meme on my Facebook feed today:
NEVER USE A SELF CHECKOUT
1) They kill jobs
2) Self-checkout machines don’t contribute with payroll taxes
3) They are not really that convenient
SHARE IF YOU AGREE
I’m not sharing, but a lot of people are.
These kinds of posts are invariably followed by a raft of virtue-signaling comments from shoppers who refuse to check themselves out and will stand in any length of line to stand in solidarity with the working men and women of America.
If I were actually harming workers by scanning my own groceries, I’d stand with you. But it’s a misguided crusade.
Let me take points one and two from the meme above together, because they have essentially the same answer: There is no shortage of grocery jobs.
There’s a reason every time you walk into a supermarket there’s a giant sign at the door begging you to come to work for them.
In fact, employment in the food-and-beverage sales sector is at an all-time high, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In June, there were just shy of 3.17 million people working in the sector, which includes grocery and liquor stores.
In June of 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic shook things up a bit, that number was 3.07 million. And 10 years ago, when self-scan was a lot less prevalent than it is now, it was 2.85 million.
Granted, there are fewer live-person checkout stands open than there once were.
But while you’re whining about having to scan your own groceries once or maybe twice a week, I’d invite you to imagine what it’s like to do that for eight hours, five days a week.
Amid the hundreds of memes and posts and comments I’ve seen decrying self-checkout, I have yet to see one from anyone wanting to put on an apron and take up their position behind the cash register.
The checkers didn’t go anywhere, they just have better jobs now. It’s one of the few silver linings to come out of the pandemic.
For fear of contracting COVID, a lot of us felt uncomfortable going inside the store and shopping for our own groceries. The pandemic supercharged and mainstreamed the practice of online grocery ordering with either delivery or pickup.
When the danger faded and we could return to unmasked grocery shopping, a lot of shoppers discovered they actually liked online ordering better and kept doing it.
And groceries don’t put themselves in the cart.
Current statistics aren’t available, but you only have to visit your neighborhood supermarket to see that there are fewer staffed checkout stands and more employees moving through the aisles with carts pulling stuff off the shelves.
Maybe it’s just me, but I’d much rather be walking around the store fulfilling people’s needs than standing at a counter saying “Do you have a Dillons card?” hundreds of times a day. It seems more stimulating and it’s better exercise.
And I’ll briefly address point three from the meme, that self-checkout isn’t more convenient.
It is.
Remember back in the day, when you’d get stuck behind somebody with enough groceries to provision an Arctic expedition, while the ice cream in your cart was melting into chocolate milk?
I sure do.
So I’m going to self-scan my groceries whenever I want.
If you want to be a grocery martyr, have at it. It’s your time to waste for no good reason.
But if you really want to make a difference, let’s do something about suppliers cramming too many bags into the racks and crushing all the potato chips.
