Jobs of the future: services, super-brands and startups

The machine and the man. Photo by me.

Automation is killing the job market, not China. That’s the message in this post recently posted on Hacker News.

I’m not sure I agree.

I can see two very clear trends when it comes to where new jobs are created.

One is the shift from industry jobs to service jobs.

Did you know that globally, farming has been the most common profession since basically the dawn of civilization up until about a decade ago? Now it’s service jobs.

Humans helping other humans, this is a type of jobs that will never go away because humans have qualities (“the golden scarcities“) that machines can never possess regardless of if they pass Turing tests or not.

Forget the factory worker, I want to see more hairdressers, singers, gardeners, interior decorators, designers, artists, coaches and ocularists.

The second is the bleeding edge of innovation and super-brands that have shorter and shorter lifespans. The share of the economy belonging to the mega-corps is decreasing. Smaller and faster is the way of the future. This is the era of the startup economy. The only thing that will remain big are the brands – mindshare.

So there you have it: services, super-brands and startups.

That’s what the economy will look like the next 50 years. Heck, it’s what it looks like today!

At least the part that’s working.