Wise young people who are looking for a career in the grocery business might take a look at the trend lines for the implementation of Radio Frequency Identification, or RFID. It is that technology, being implemented by Wal-Mart, that threatens the jobs of the striking grocery workers, not the low wages Wal-Mart pays.

RFID soon will permit remote reading of an entire shopping cart as you take it out the door and will debit your bank account before you open the car door -- no grocery checker necessary, thank you. Just as today's scanners can reorder when inventory gets low, the new "smart shelf" can do that and more.

RFID already is being used by a number of firms, usually at the pallet or box level, and just to control inventory. Japan is setting aside an entire frequency spectrum for RFID use, and firms such as Bennington, Gillette and Wal-Mart are implementing the use of this growing automation. Mobil gas stations use the technology with their keychain "Pass" system, and ID readers on toll roads use the same technology.

Wal-Mart has demanded that its top 100 suppliers implement the RFID program by Jan. 1, 2005, and that all of its suppliers do so by 2006. RFID will then move the technology from the warehouse into the stores and out the doors.

Striking grocery clerks will keep their jobs only so long as their employers' increasing costs do not cross the trend lines of the diminishing trend line of the cost of RFID. When those lines cross, it will be goodbye to many grocery jobs. Best guess: five years if the union wins the current argument, 10 years if they lose. The smart grocery workers will study for a career in RFID.

That is the story of automation: It is used only when the high cost of implementation is exceeded by the higher cost of human labor. (An Israeli company recently announced a machine that could manufacture 10 billion RFID labels a year.)

Nevertheless, RFID is not an easy solution to implement. It introduces new levels of questions about privacy. It is difficult to implement down to the item level. Some new technology may interrupt it, delaying a change in the current conditions.

But RFID, or something similar, is why any attempt to unionize Wal-Mart workers is doomed to fail, and today's unionized grocery workers are working against their own best interests. The faster the workers increase the cost of their labor, or fail to control it, the sooner their jobs will go away. To many workers, RFID is not a problem because they are near retirement, or are only working at their low-skill job temporarily while they gain another skill.

RFID is another step in "disintermediation" -- the loss of intermediaries.

Grocery workers cannot win; they can only cut their losses and hold onto their jobs for as long as possible. It is not out of greed that corporations are looking for lower costs -- it's called competition. Unions seem to believe that competition for lower prices for consumers is good, but that competition for lower wages is bad.

In the end, the competition for lower wages may not come from exported jobs or illegal immigrants, but from technology. Keep an eye on the trend lines. Then get trained for technology.

Allen Hemphill of Escondido is a real estate broker.