When I was a kid, there were no yoga teachers. Heck, no one ever even heard of yoga in our town. Today, that little town in Wisconsin has 7 yoga studios.
Oshkosh went from 0 yoga teachers in the 90’s to perhaps dozens today. We also added pilates instructors, meditation coaches, acupuncturists.
But that’s not all. Strange sounding jobs involving computers popped up.
One was called “search engine optimization.” My mom bravely waded into the nascent industry in 1999, and we were suddenly catapulted from the poor to the middle class.
This happened as factories closed all around us. Places that employed hundreds became vast gravel lots.
Surely the town was devastated. Right?
Wrong.
Decaying warehouses along the river became lovely apartments. New businesses opened and the local university expanded.
The town’s population grew.
Today, Oshkosh and America as a whole have some of the lowest unemployment rates on record. And yet we can’t seem to stop worrying.
A quarter of workers are worried that AI will put them out of a job, according to a CNBC survey. In some fields, that’s as high as half.
I don’t doubt that AI will make some jobs unnecessary. For example, an AI chatbot could reduce the need for call center staff.
But does anyone love working in a call center? I don’t think so.
That person can move into a more fulfilling job elsewhere. Some may become EMT’s, like my friend Matt — a job that’s deeply rewarding and almost impossible to automate.
Others will take jobs that don’t exist yet.
The vast movement of workers into new industries has happened before.
In 1910, 14 million Americans worked on farms out of a population of around 100 million. In the 21st century, that fell to just a couple of million workers.
And they were feeding a population more than three times the size.
All those former farm workers didn’t languish on the dole. They got jobs in factories.
My childhood saw the end of those factories. They either moved abroad or automated most of the employees out of work.
And yet, unemployment is at rock bottom. Meanwhile, median wages have more than doubled since 1991, even after inflation.
There is no limit to human creativity or human desires. As computers take over one task, we’ll create another.
If we could look decades ahead, we wouldn’t believe the prosperity we’re about to enjoy.
Now, let’s go get it.
Do you think AI will cause mass unemployment? Leave a comment and let us know!
If you enjoyed this post, subscribe for more like this!
More on tech:
Meet My New Investment Analyst: GPT-4
Save Money on Stuff I Use:
This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.
More on Fundrise in this post.
If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!
I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!
I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.
Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.
Tremendous 
Leave a comment