Pizza Hut says driverless delivery could create jobs for humans

Earlier this week, Pizza Hut unveiled plans to launch a fleet of driverless delivery vans — a sign that automation has reached the world of greasy comfort food. Then the chain did something pizza makers rarely do: It offered an economic theory on Twitter.

After a user pointed out that driverless cars could destroy the need for drivers, Pizza Hut said the technology might just boost demand for human workers.

“It actually could create more jobs by opening the pool of ‘drivers’ to those who do not own vehicles,” Pizza Hut tweeted Tuesday. “They might act more as servers, focusing on hospitality.”

Will machines steal our jobs, or will they unleash other employment options?

“It’s hard to forecast exactly what is going to happen,” said David Beede, an economist at the Department of Commerce. “Workers in occupations that deliver goods and services, like pizza delivery people — those types of work activities are most at risk of displacement by self-driving vehicles.”

It’s too early to know what such displacement could look like, he said. Delivery drivers could face mass layoffs, or some could transition into roles the Pizza Hut brand account hinted at on Twitter.

“Instead of driving, they could do more customer service work,” he said, such as monitoring vehicles, making sure they’re running correctly and answering customer questions.

Though Ford, General Motors, Google, Apple and other companies have all poured major resources into driverless cars, the models have a long way to go before they flood American roads.

“These technologies don’t work perfectly yet,” said Michael Chui, a partner at the McKinsey Global Institute. “They’re not great in the rain or snow. There are issues when lane markings aren’t clear.”

Tom Davenport, a business professor at Babson College in Massachusetts, predicts a bleaker future for delivery drivers.

“Human drivers are more expensive and less reliable,” he said, “and the fast food delivery workforce is pretty transient: It’s hard to get them, and it’s hard to keep them.”