Signals for what’s next – and what matters
Health ⎪ Innovation ⎪ Society
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Hey Reader,
We used to buy things. Then we bought services. Now we buy who we want to become.
Or who we want others to think we’ve become.
Reinvention is the new wealth.
The next great shift in the economy is not about selling products or services, its about selling and recoding identity.
If done well, this means our social order will go from labor to data to meaning.
If done poorly, we all become character’s in some else’s transformation script.
Your business depends on navigating this transition.
The Four Phases of the American Economy
America’s Economy may be reverting to a 19th century model if Trump has his way. Nevertheless, here’s a a rough framework of how to think of our country’s evolution.
- Manufacturing (1900’s-1970’s) – physical labor, tangible goods. Icon: the Factory
- Service Economy (1970’s-2020’s) – professional + credentialed labor (finance, law, medicine, consulting), suburban meritocrats Icon: the MBA
- Digital/Platform Economy (2000’s-2020s) – social media, scale through code, creator economy, digital nomads. Icon: the Influencer
- Transformation Economy (2020’s – 2045+) human attention, identity, and capabilities are the center of modern business models. Icon: the AI enhanced consumer
Industries Transformed
Almost every industry has a new purpose or new contours in the transformation economy.
- Media → Meaning Making (Niche sub cultures; Substack; Podcasts; Memes as Ideology)
- Work → Self-Expression (the ideal of work as a source of meaning, identity, and ? spirit).
- Consumption → Creation + Consciousness (what you buy and what you create aligns with your desired self).
If you’re running a business of any kind (we all are by definition, if “only” the Startup of You), the question is NOT
“What services or goods do I offer?”
but rather:
“Who do my customers become by engaging with me?”
The New Healthcare
Healthcare is not immune from transformation.
In fact, it should be the essential transformation industry.
Yet, healthcare is the great legacy system trapped in a service economy model with fee for service, insurance gatekeeping, opaque pricing and regulatory capture.
What we will see is Healthcare → Healing + Optimization (Wellness; Longevity; AI enhanced diagnostics) Icon: Biohacker
Health will be less about disease management and more about identity transformation, especially for the young, fit, and relatively healthy (< 2 co-morbidities).
Doctors will split into two camps:
- Technicians in the System – “Doc in a Box.” There are managed not only by insurance but by algorithms. Autonomy and reimbursement decline. They are safe but stagnant because they are commodities not true professionals.
- Guides in the Transformation Ecosystem – In roles akin to a sherpa. They curate wisdom and data not only through medicine but also health coaching, lifestyle design and content creation. They build IP, audience, assets outside traditional stakeholders.
Postscript
Doctors, creators, founders: You’re already in the transformation economy. You just don’t know it yet.
People want you to help them build their future selves.
Their best selves.
Transformation is the ultimate source of all value.
Do that and money won’t be a constraint in your lives.
Nor will fulfillment.
Tomorrow Can’t Wait,
