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Comment by mb_72 | Hacker News Reader

> Obviously they’d rather the company hire more workers and charge them s little extra.

It's happened the other way around - self checkout didn't exist, and when it was introduced prices didn't drop even though employment expenses are now lower. There isn't even an incentivising discount for using the self-checkout.

I've seen people have no end of problems with self-checkout systems, and would rather I have an experienced and 'expert' human dealing with the scanning and check-out part that I can also interact with.

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Groceries are the most low margin retail business at 1-2 percent. So the cost savings have definitely been passed on to the customer, unless you can find figures to the contrary.

By "the cost savings have been passed on to the customer", do you mean that a) self-checkout has caused the customer to pay more for groceries, or that b) the cost of groceries has remained the same (or decreased), but now the store makes extra profits from it because they don't have to pay as many clerks?

If b) then we're back to where I started: you might as well complain about the discount on Swiss cheese. You don't pay more for youg goods, you may even pay less- but the store is making more money anyway.

I won't say "where is the harm in that" because there is certainly harm to the clerks- but that is a separate issue from the extreme stretching of reason to justify shoplifting in the passage I commented on.

Neither a nor b.

Take the wholesale price of the product, add rent, delivery, payment processing, in store labour and all the other expenses involved in running a store, then add 1-2%. That gives you the price you pay in store. That formula hasn't changed since self checkout was introduced, but the cost figures have changed.

I don't see how self-checkout does not come under "all the other expenses involved in running a store". Also, I dont' see how it comes under the 1-2%, which I assume is the profit that the store makes.

I still don't see how all this says that "the cost savings have been passed on to the customer", as per your previous comment.

> So the cost savings have definitely been passed on to the customer, unless you can find figures to the contrary.

I think it's more up to the supermarkets to demonstrate that self-checkout is lowering prices. As a consumer I wouldn't 'definitely' believe any cost savings would be passed onto customers, and IMO it'd be foolish to do so.

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