this kind of work could offer a meaningful employment to the masses obsoleted by technology. most white collar jobs aren’t that hard to automate and will be soon, so the question has always been, what do you do when only 5% of the population has a job? creating artisanal products and getting really good at it, like the japanese, would fill the week with something interesting to do, and your local community would appreciate the results.

The transition to an increasingly craft-centered economy will not be without agony. Woehrle and Premo succeeded because both had access to investors and the innate ability to segue from the salaried confines of corporate life to a much riskier, entrepreneurial world. A craft economy is far less stable: those who succeed this year may fail the next, as their once-unique products become commodities made cheaply overseas. Still, this new world seems, to some extent, inevitable. Instead of rolling our eyes at self-conscious Brooklyn hipsters pickling everything in sight, we might look to them as guides to the future of the American economy. Just don’t tell them that. It would break their hearts to be called model 21st-century capitalists.

background reading:
Are we seeing the beginning of the end of work?
What will the economy of the future look like?