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Comment by fizx | Hacker News Reader

A problem with your vision of the future is that finding (and keeping) a profitable niche is hard.

Historically, you could always own the corner store, and always get business from at least your block. However the trends driving the "jobless future" will see local businesses absorbed into larger entities. The corner store will be replaced with instant delivery.

So you have to find a niche that is global, and when you find it, you'll instantly be bombarded by global competitors, and you'll have to grow or die.

In the "jobless future," individualism looks like etsy--super-niche artisan work for the status of owning something unique. Handmade luxury items can't replace an entire economy.

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I agree that artisan work can't replace an entire economy. But I also don't think that artisan work will be the only viable means of earning a living in that world.

Notably, I don't think the corner store (in terms of local services) is going very far. Sure, retail has an enormous battle to fight. But that's just one front.

People will always depend on each another for one thing or another. Beyond retail, whether it's local products like food or local services like domestic contracting or professional services, I think the community will play an even more significant role than it does now in spite of a burgeoning global scene.

I've been deeply influenced by Charles Hugh Smith's writings on community. It's a term we tend to devalue, but it's one Smith thinks is a fundamental building block for the future. He's a bit extreme, as he tends to expect a large macro-disturbance, but his ideas are sound. Here's one piece:

http://www.oftwominds.com/blogsept13/community-economy9-13.h...

> Notably, I don't think the corner store (in terms of local services) is going very far.

A lot of services can be automated, and actual retail -- well, once you have sufficiently economical self-driving vehicles and product picking robots, local automated delivery hubs from which products are dispersed to purchasers are a lot more likely than local retail shops -- they'll be "stores" in the sense of places that store things, but customers won't ever have to set foot in one; potentially, no one will go there except to service the robots.

>> finding (and keeping) a profitable niche is hard

...which is why evolution will have to regain control.

Governments are antinatural in their obsession with increasing the number of citizens - not healthy, prodctive, citizens, but SSNs.

Initially, living was for the fittest, not for everyone.

As someone extremely average, I will be among the first to go extinct. And I see no problem with this, as my disappearance will free up space and resources for those who are better.

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