Self-checkout seems to have reached a peak. Some retailers are pulling back on the systems, apparently due to intentional and unintentional thefts, and there are signs that customers have grown weary of scanning their own purchases and waiting in long, slow lines while a single attendant tries to manage the inevitable malfunctions.
This doesn’t mean that Sacramento should step in. Yet it is, because that’s how Sacramento operates.
Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas of California’s 28th District in Los Angeles has introduced Senate Bill 1446, known as the Self-Checkout Ban. Under this legislation, which is still in the committee stage, “A grocery establishment or retail drug establishment” can provide “a self-service checkout option for customers” only when:
- “At least one manual checkout station is staffed by an employee of the establishment who is available to any given customer at the time that a self-service checkout option is made available to that customer,” and
- “Self-service checkouts are limited to purchases of 10 or fewer items,” and
- “No more than two self-service checkout stations are simultaneously monitored by any one employee of the establishment.”
SB 1446 also says customers would be “prohibited from using self-service checkout to purchase” items that require them “to provide a form of identification, including, but not limited to, alcohol and tobacco products” as well as goods “subject to special theft-deterrent measures.”
The bill further intrudes into private matters by demanding retailers complete a “worker and consumer impact assessment,” that has to be “provided to employees potentially affected by the workplace technology, or their collective bargaining representative,” and posted “in a location accessible to its employees and customers.” The language doesn’t explicitly require employers to submit copies to Sacramento. But they would be justified if they were concerned that this means their business plans will be reviewed – and either accepted or rejected – by the government.
According to Politico, Smallwood-Cuevas claims her bill “would help protect jobs while addressing retail theft, which has become a preoccupation of both industry and politicians in recent months.”
In Politico’s words, “the bill marries the interests of labor unions protecting jobs from being replaced by AI and police groups eager to address retail theft.” Its sponsors include “the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, California Labor Federation and Prosecutors Alliance of California.”
Smallwood-Cuevas’ statement is absurd. Yes, it will protect jobs, but it’s not her job to address retail theft by dictating policy for private companies. It is her job to address retail theft through innovative legislation, and the repeal of laws that incentivize thieves. The industry is quite capable of dealing with inventory shrinkage without lawmakers telling companies how to run their businesses, and “police groups” can fulfill their duties if they’re not handcuffed by politicians.
As for those jobs the senator has taken upon herself to protect, has it occurred to her that in the churn of a growing economy jobs will be lost – and then replaced with better jobs?
Oh, but those might not be union jobs and won’t be tolerated by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, California Labor Federation and Prosecutors Alliance of California (which despite its strong name is run by the former chief of staff to George Gascon and Chesa Boudin and is not about pursuing strong public safety protections). They will do what all unions do: everything possible to keep their paying membership rolls high, even if the jobs are make-work positions that hold back growth.
The list of controls that Sacramento and local governments has placed on private businesses, from bans on modern consumer conveniences to board room composition to their choice of fuel for cooking to efforts to outlaw paper receipts and setting a punishing minimum wage is staggering. No wonder that, according to one recent poll, two-thirds of California small businesses “are either planning a move (10%), considering a move (30%) or they are feeling trapped, wanting to move but can’t afford it (27%).”
This is what happens when elected officials believe they have the moral authority to run private businesses from their 10th Street granite and limestone palace. They create a self-checkout of another type, one in which the “customer” just leaves.
Kerry Jackson is the William Clement Fellow in California Reform at the Pacific Research Institute.
