[erikpukinskis]

(Forced) unemployment won't go over 20% so your question is based on a false premise.

But regardless, rent-seeking can't support the economy. People won't be "employed" as landlords, they'll be employed as property managers. There could easily be a billion property managers added to the global economy. Just imagine everyone starts expecting their homes to be professionally taken care of, every window frame refinished, every outdoor space professionally managed as a farm or native ecology. We could literally employ the entire human race doing only that work.

Because the details of property management are different in every culture, and every neighborhood, and those details are based in vague cultural norms, AIs will never be able to do the long tail. A robot could manage the 50% default "I don't care what my house looks like so long as it's nice-ish" market, but not the other half, "I want home to feel like home" market.

[milesrout]

Unemployment has gone over 20% before. No reason it can't go over 20% again.