The Canary in the Coal Mine

Artificial intelligence is rewriting the foundations of the economy. Output rises while the social compacts that tied survival to labour begin to splinter. The old 9–5 job once bundled income, healthcare, retirement, and identity into a predictable package. Today that bundle is fraying.

Traditional employment is not the villain; it is the warning signal. As predictable work is automated, anchoring survival to employment concentrates power in a shrinking number of firms, erodes benefits, and exposes billions of people to precarity.

Keeping survival tethered to vanishing jobs is a design flaw. Unless institutions evolve, collapse is not a threat but a schedule. The Empowerment Economy begins by acknowledging the alarm and refusing to ignore it.