Where Are The Coopers?

The coopers were a job market segment that was booming 200 years ago. If someone needed a barrel it was a cooper they would go to. Nearly every community, town and village had a local cooper/ Then in 1811 a patent was filed. and along came automated ways to manufacturer the same barrels, faster, cheaper and with more precision. The market improved, but the jobs were displaced. Barrels were still made, and sold, but not the same way.

Before the farm machinery we had manual plowmen. The tractor destroyed the job but improved the industry. Like the cooper every community used to have a blacksmith, but the forging process destroyed the jobs there too, but we still have steel hammers and iron goods- just not the jobs. Shoemakers or cobblers, gone.

The transistor changed things too. Radio repair servicemen no longer exist. Vacuum tube assembly manufacturing is gone, so too are switchboard operators and CRT rebuilders. Change happens.

Then we have the internet and mobile phone age. When was the last time you bought a paper map? What about the Yellow Pages? What about renting a movie on DVD? It is a struggle to find a place to print your photos from actual film these days. Can travel agents even afford to pay their lease these days? How many cashiers have been replaced by self checkout? Where do you buy a beeper/pager in 2026? Lyft and Uber have nearly destroyed the Taxi industry. Change happens.

People always look at the glass as half empty and it's doom and gloom as technology marches forward. I am sure the man who picked the quill off the peacock was disappointed when Bic started producing the ballpoint pen in mass. Or the barber was upset when Gillette started selling the disposable safety razor and shaving cream. But you think nothing of shaving or writing a note without dipping a feather into a bowl of ink. We humans always adapt.

Artificial Intelligence combined with robotics is going to change society the most and the quickest than humanity has ever seen -a 36 month countdown that has already started. People will have fear, but that is natural. Humans have said with every change in technology that the end of civilization is coming because if this or that new thing. But here we are still, raising babies, eating with family, laighung with friends, trying to find time for hobbies and interests - getting by. We always get by.

Just like all the jobs that have been displaced in the past, once we adapt we actually like the change. When was the last time you roasted your own coffee beans, or produced your own fabric from the sheep outside? Have you dipped a feather into an ink bowl lately or are you ok with the 39 cent Bic pen?

You may not see the advantages of AI or robotics at the moment, and when you lose your job you will be angry and worried for sure. But we will adapt, try to spot the advantages of these changes. How can we benefit from the tech? I certainly would prefer the robot to do my 1.5 second laser surgery on my eyes rather than my ophthalmologist trying to hold a hand-held laser in his shaky human hands, wouldn't you?