This makes me wonder what a world without jobs will look like. Will a good quality life, food, shelter, money, etc just be human rights?
Based on these constructs he developed "Four Futures" as follows:
-Egalitarianism and abundance: communism
-Hierarchy and abundance: rentism
-Egalitarianism and scarcity: socialism
-Hierarchy and scarcity: exterminism
Frase definitely swings from one side of the fence, so it may not be your kind of thing - but it's one take on the idea.
So get used to a future where you either have a personal entourage, or will be busy doing errands for people who actually have money. And chances are much higher for the latter.
I imagine when we get there, we are going to have an absurd concentration of wealth as the automated means of production are in the hands of very few ultra-wealthy, and everyone else is destitute because their factories and robots make everything for effectively free. That sounds like bloody revolution.
Or, on the other hand, the creative economy could turn into a huge engine of bespoke design and manufacturing, so that real people start to own mostly customized items. I can definitely see Etsy, crowdfunding, and merchandising sites heading this way. I guess "we are all My Little Pony dolls now".
But rather than toy fads, I was more referring to how each character or doll has accessories paired to them and only them. So rather than buying 2 dolls and 5 generic dresses and swapping pieces between the dolls, they're now selling 6 dolls with 6 dresses, plus more stupid little accessories and such.
My hypothesis was that as manufacturing of consumer goods gets cheaper and processes get better, real people are going to stop consuming mass-manufactured goods entirely and start to become more like the dolls. Instead of my buying clothes at a department store (for instance), and thus wearing much the same stuff as my friends, family and coworkers, it will start to become economical for me to go to a neo-clothier and purchase items specifically measured, designed, cut, manufactured and adjusted for me. Quality and uniqueness start to become emphasized in consumer goods over mass-production quantities.
Basically, "The Diamond Age". As people say, "the future is here, it's just unevenly distributed."
"Ah, you ask, but what about the people? Very good question. Smart machines may make higher GDP possible, but also reduce the demand for people — including smart people. So we could be looking at a society that grows ever richer, but in which all the gains in wealth accrue to whoever owns the robots."