I think, for restaurants, what happened was commercial real-estate getting crazy expensive and clientele not cooking for themselves like they used to do. The first hurt wages as many restaurants were fighting thin margins, and the second made it easier for restaurants to sneak in the untrained to cook. Once the untrained were acceptable, it was a race to the bottom.
If the customers would not accept food cooked by the untrained, it would not have happened. Customers used to not accept food like that, but when margin pressures forced restaurants to use untrained labor, they found they could get away with it. They haven't looked back.
For starters, you have a very weird definition of 'untrained' when it comes to food production. Secondly, the food IS cooked by people who specialize in cooking food.
I surely can't compete with a sous-chef.
Washing dishes and bussing them back and forth from tables to the kitchen does not require the same level of specialization.
I worked kitchens for about 10 years and have a culinary degree. I can tell you that in many restaurants the cooks have never tasted the type of food that they are supposed to be cooking. They throw in the ingredients but what comes out is a sad given the resources at their disposal.
My grandmother can cook better than many places using standard household equipment. It really is sad what we have done to both the culinary world and the home kitchen.
Think about cooking different dishes for years, 40 to 60 hours a week. How good do you think they should be? Most good chefs that gave a damn and had the option left the business.
