“Teenage jobs” that teach life skills are being eliminated due to robotics.

Terrence O’Brien from The Verge (paywalled, but free for News+ subscribers here):

Stocking shelves, scooping ice cream, flipping burgers, and delivering takeout aren’t glorious jobs. But they used to be the sort of thing that gave young adults and teenagers a first taste of independence. They offered valuable lessons in managing a budget and taught them important interpersonal skills. But the knock-on effects of online shopping, automation, and digital media have largely driven them out of the workforce.

Teens have voluntarily removed themselves from the labor market because they’re forced to fight over an ever-shrinking pool of jobs with an ever-expanding pool of workers. And now, we’re training robots to take what few scraps are left. Even bagging groceries isn’t safe.

Some disturbing numbers:

The average age of a retail worker in the US in 2024 was 38.7. In clothing retail specifically, which skews much younger than retail as a whole, it was 33, up dramatically from 29.3 in 2015.