Structural Unemployment

Economics predicts that the economy will destroy old careers as the economy works toward efficiency.  For example, telephone operators have been replaced by automated phone trees, cell phones, and Google.  Yahoo has an excellent article, "Is Your Job About to Become Obsolete?" that shows how creative destruction shows the economy working toward efficiency.

One career that is disappearing is farming.  This is from the article,

Between 2010 and 2020, some 96,100 farmers and ranchers will go out of business, the BLS says. “As land, machinery, seed, and chemicals become more expensive, only well-capitalized farmers and corporations will be able to buy many of the farms that become available,” the BLS predicts. “These larger, more productive farms are better able to withstand the adverse effects of climate and price fluctuations on farm output and income.”

If you like bluegrass music, then Art Stevenson and High Water plays a song John Deere that is fantastic.  In this song Art tells a tale of the demise of the family farm.  I suggest that some of the changes in this market come from economies of scale and changes in technology.  I predict changes in teaching will follow the same path.