Better automation tools would almost certainly increase the chance of large-scale job loss in the event of a minimum wage hike. From a business perspective, it

Better automation tools would almost certainly increase the chance of large-scale job loss in the event of a minimum wage hike. From a business perspective, it's a cost-benefit calculation - when the cost of automating a job is lower than the cost of paying a human to do it, automation will eventually win. If automation cost goes down and human labor cost goes up, the threshold shifts in favor of fewer human workers (although the profits get redistributed to the remaining workers/owners, so you get a continuation of today's inequality push).