ATMs the cause of our bad economy?

According to the President. [Link]

Obama recently expressed a view of the economy in which technological innovation is viewed as a threat to jobs:

President Obama explained to NBC News that the reason companies aren't hiring is not because of his policies, it's because the economy is so automated. ... "There are some structural issues with our economy where a lot of businesses have learned to become much more efficient with a lot fewer workers. You see it when you go to a bank and you use an ATM, you don't go to a bank teller, or you go to the airport and you're using a kiosk instead of checking in at the gate."

This is a perfectly static view, which would have protected jobs in the buggy whip industry by preventing the creation and expansion of the auto industry; would have protected jobs at glass tube manufacturers against the advent of flat screen televisions; would have barred the creation of the cell phone industry because of all the jobs lost in the land line business, and so on and so on.

This is your modern union mentality at work, in which the preservation of the economic status quo takes priority over innovation and creation.  Job losses in old industries make for good 30-second political ads, while the creation of new and more vibrant industries which create more jobs takes too long to explain on television.

He really, truly doesn't understand.  It's frightening.  

The reason employers are not hiring is due in large part to fear of Obama's economic policies which raise the cost of hiring.  

And the ATM industry is not happy. [Link]

‘President Obama should never use ATMs as an example of how technology replaces human labor because ATMs today play a critical role in providing extensive employment in the ATM and cash-in-transit industries. In addition, ATMs provide an indispensible range of services to customers, including all-hours access to their own banked cash. With over 400,000 in America alone, ATMs have become the main distribution channel for the distribution of cash in all modern economies and cash remains by far the most popular form of payment by US consumers. The whole purpose of the invention of the ATM back in 1967 was to make cash available outside of bank hours, liberating citizens to access their banked money 24 x 7, a huge increase in convenience.  Given these major roles of the ATM, it would be quite irrational to turn the clock back to the 1960s to a time before ATMs.