If most of your customer base is not working, how will you sell your product? Henry Ford knew that
Our new Robber Barons have the solution; guaranteed income from the gov’t.
And machines don’t pay taxes to the federal treasury.
Why do you need a customer base?
In fact, why would you need people?
The problem is that the whole underpinnings of free market capitalism rests on the ability of human A to provide value to human B such that human B will voluntarily give part of himself in exchange.
When all of our physical needs (shelter, food, medicine, travel, recreation, protection, etc...) are being provided by AI and automation, the value that other humans can provide to you shrinks to zero.
Money has historically been used as a measure of one’s value to others. This will have to change in the future and we will have to find a new system of distributing resources. I am honestly terrified of every possibility that my inferior mind can come up with.