Fast Food Chains' AI Chatbots Failed to Assist Job Applicants with Scheduling Interviews

Laws that address this harm

Policy angle: Classified under Socioeconomic & Environmental Harms (Increased inequality and decline in employment quality) in the MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy; 5 recorded instruments address this use case.

• Colorado AI Act Colorado (United States) · Repealed · binding
• Framework Convention on AI (CETS 225) Council of Europe · Adopted · binding
• India DPDP Act India · Partially applicable · binding
• Law on Artificial Intelligence (2025) Kazakhstan · Adopted · binding
• Law No. 132/2025 on artificial intelligence Italy · In force · binding

Matched from the record's risk domain and country to the instruments recorded here. A reviewer can correct the match in the repository (data/external/incident_overrides.yaml).

News reports (1)

Titles link to the original publisher; report text is not reproduced here.

1. 9 Jun 2023
   I applied to McDonald's and 4 other fast food jobs, but the chatbots and automated process made it impossible for me to get hired

   businessinsider.com · Amanda Claypool

Who was involved

Alleged deployer

Wendy'S, Mcdonald'S, Hardee'S

Alleged developer

Wendy'S, Mcdonald'S, Hardee'S

Alleged harmed party

Fast Food Job Applicants, Amanda Claypool

Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)

Risk domain

Socioeconomic & Environmental Harms

Risk subdomain

6.2 Increased inequality and decline in employment quality

Causal entity

AI

Intent

Unintentional

Timing

Post-deployment

Harm level

—

Sectors

—

Countries

—

Risk entries describing this failure mode

Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 6.2.

• Labour exploitation

  "Labour exploitation - Use of under-paid and/or offshore labour to develop, manage or optimise a technology system."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Societal destabilisation

  "Societal destabilisation - Societal instability in the form of strikes, demonstrations and other types of civil unrest caused by loss of jobs to technology, unfair algorithmic outcomes, disinformation, etc."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Political instability

  "Political instability - Political polarisation or unrest caused by increased inequality, job losses, over- dependence on technology making societies vulnerable to systemic failures, etc, arising from or amplified by the...

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Job loss/losses

  "Job loss/losses - Replacement/displacement of human jobs by a technology system, leading to increased unemployment, inequality, reduced consumer spending, and social friction."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Societal inequality

  "Societal inequality - Increased difference in social status or wealth between individuals or groups caused or amplified by a technology system, leading to the loss of social and community wellbeing/cohesion and destabil...

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Economic

  "AI is predicted to bring increased GDP per capita by performing existing jobs more efficiently and compensating for a decline in the workforce, especially due to population aging, the potential substitution of many low-...

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Increased income disparity

  "While AI is predicted to bring increased GDP per capita by performing existing jobs more efficiently and compensating for a decline in the workforce, especially due to population aging, the potential substitution of man...

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Effects on the Workforce

  "Rapid advances in LLMs pose three distinct sets of challenges for workers’ incomes (Korinek and Stiglitz, 2019; Susskind, 2023). First, they are likely to accelerate the rate of job turnover and disruption —– affecting...

  Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

Incidents in the same risk subdomain

• 21 Oct 2024Polish Radio Station Replaces Human Hosts with AI-Generated Presenters to Simulate Interviewing Deceased Poet Wisława Szymborska
• 1 Nov 2021Kenyan Data Annotators Allegedly Exposed to Graphic Content for OpenAI's AI
• 1 Sep 2016RealPage Algorithm Allegedly Inflates Rents and Reduces Competition in Housing Market
• 25 Sep 2015Amazon Flex Drivers Allegedly Fired via Automated Employee Evaluations
• 14 Aug 2014Kronos Scheduling Algorithm Allegedly Caused Financial Issues for Starbucks Employees