Post-Labor Economics: The Essential Response to AI Workforce Disruption
Team³ presents a pragmatic vision for thriving in the AI economy—where automation replaces traditional jobs but creates unprecedented opportunity for those prepared to seize it.
Why Traditional Economics Fails in the AI Era
The Economic Challenge
Global economies falter as AI disrupts labor markets at an unprecedented pace. Canada's GDP growth lags, productivity declines, and traditional jobs vanish under automation's weight. The fundamental relationship between labor and value creation is being rewritten.
The Post-Labor Opportunity
Team³ recognizes this disruption as both challenge and opportunity. When machines handle routine tasks, humans can focus on creation, innovation, and ownership. Our cooperative model transforms workers from wage-earners to equity-holders in an empire of ability.
From Labor to Ownership
The post-labor economy demands a shift from trading time for money to building and owning productive assets. Team³ provides the framework for skilled individuals to leverage AI rather than compete with it, creating a future where prosperity flows from ownership, not wages.
Total Economics with Agentic Machines
Beyond Zero-Sum Thinking
Traditional economics views AI as replacing human jobs in a zero-sum game. Team³'s Total Economics recognizes that properly harnessed AI creates abundance that expands opportunities. By owning the machines rather than working for them, makers capture the productivity gains of automation.
Automation of Essentials
In the Team³ model, AI and robotics handle essential production—food, shelter, energy—freeing human creativity for higher pursuits. This foundation of automated abundance secures basic needs while enabling members to focus on innovation and expansion.
Equity Over Income
The cooperative structure shifts focus from wages to ownership. Members contribute skills to collective enterprises and receive shares of growing assets and production capacity. This asset-based approach provides greater security than traditional employment in an AI-disrupted economy.
The Empire of Able Makers
Prosperity Through Ability
Creating wealth through applied skills and innovation
Cooperative Ownership
Sharing equitably in the fruits of collective work
Skilled Contribution
Leveraging technical expertise in practical applications
Community of Purpose
Uniting around shared vision and values
Team³ rebuilds the connection between ability and prosperity that AI threatens to sever. Rather than competing with automation, skilled makers harness it, creating an ecosystem where technical expertise translates directly into shared wealth. This empire of ability stands as a bulwark against economic displacement, offering purpose and prosperity to those willing to build the future with their hands and minds.
Territory, Energy, Agriculture, and Manufacturing
Territory
Secure land in Western Canada for self-sufficient communities and expansion
Energy
Develop renewable systems for independence from external grids
Agriculture
Create automated food production to ensure community sustenance
Manufacturing
Build fabrication capacity for everything from homes to spacecraft
The TEAM framework represents the essential resources needed to create a self-sufficient, AI-integrated economy. By securing these foundational elements, the cooperative establishes independence from traditional economic systems while building the infrastructure for expansion both on Earth and beyond.
The Mondragon Model Reimagined
Democratic Governance
One member, one vote regardless of capital contribution, ensuring equality within a meritocratic framework that values skill and contribution over hierarchy. This governance structure preserves cooperative values while enabling decisive action.
Interconnected Businesses
A network of cooperatively owned enterprises that support each other in a circular economy. Construction feeds housing, which supports community, which enables innovation. This ecosystem approach creates resilience against market fluctuations.
AI Integration
Unlike traditional cooperatives, Team³ embraces automation as a liberating force. AI and robots handle routine work, while humans direct, create, and innovate. This fundamental update to the Mondragon model prepares it for the realities of the AI economy.
Strategic Business Acquisition
Target Identification
Scout small-to-medium enterprises in Western Canada with strong fundamentals but limited growth due to capital or technology constraints. Focus on construction, drones, hydraulics, batteries, propulsion, fabrication, and 3D printing.
Discreet Negotiation
Approach owners with buyout or equity partnership offers that ensure cooperative control while respecting the business's legacy and expertise. Maintain low profile to avoid alerting competitors.
AI Modernization
Deploy artificial intelligence for operational efficiency and retrofit with robotics to boost output. Turn traditional businesses into highly automated, efficient operations that require minimal human oversight.
Ecosystem Integration
Connect the business to others in the cooperative network, creating synergies where outputs from one enterprise support the needs of others, building a self-reinforcing economic ecosystem.
Building Self-Sufficient Communities
Housing
AI-designed modular homes built using cooperative construction businesses, allocated to members without cost. These efficient structures combine sustainability with comfort, creating living spaces that foster both individual well-being and community connection.
Agriculture
Automated traditional farms and greenhouses that produce food year-round regardless of external conditions. These systems leverage Saskatchewan's agricultural expertise while minimizing human labor through careful application of robotics and AI.
Education
Technical academies that train members and their families in AI, robotics, and engineering. These learning centers prepare people of all ages for meaningful contribution to the cooperative's mission while fostering innovation and adaptability.
Space Technology Development
Earth-Based Prototyping
Develop technologies with dual applications for Earth and space, focusing on autonomous drones, robotics, and modular construction systems. This practical approach ensures innovations generate immediate value while building toward space capabilities.
Lunar Development
Create systems for lunar resource extraction, habitat construction, and sustainable presence. Design 3D-printed structures using simulated lunar regolith and robotic assembly techniques that can function in harsh extraterrestrial environments.
Mars Expansion
Extend technologies to enable long-term Mars habitation, focusing on closed-loop resource systems and manufacturing capabilities using local materials. This frontier represents humanity's ultimate insurance policy against terrestrial threats.
From Wages to Ownership
Traditional Employment
Trading time for wages with no equity
Skill Contribution
Applying expertise to cooperative projects
Asset Allocation
Receiving shares in growing enterprises
Wealth Accumulation
Building equity independent of labor hours
The post-labor economy requires fundamentally rethinking the relationship between work and wealth. Team³'s model breaks the direct link between hours worked and compensation, instead connecting contribution to ownership. Members apply their skills to cooperative enterprises and receive shares in the resulting assets, creating an equity-based prosperity that grows over time regardless of an individual's capacity for continued labor.
Western Canada Strategic Advantage
Western Canada offers unique advantages for Team³'s vision: vast low-cost land ($2,000-$10,000/acre), a skilled technology workforce, abundant natural resources, and business-friendly policies. This combination creates the perfect launching point for a cooperative empire that can expand methodically while maintaining strong foundations in territory, energy, agriculture, and manufacturing.
The Global Digital Network
10
Core Members
Initial founders in Western Canada
50
Year 3 Network
Expanding cooperative ownership
200
Year 7 Network
Multi-regional presence established
1000+
Year 15 Network
Global cooperative empire achieved
While physically anchored in Western Canada, Team³ builds a global network of able makers united by shared purpose and secure digital infrastructure. This distributed approach allows the cooperative to tap specialized expertise worldwide while maintaining its strategic center of gravity in regions with optimal conditions for physical development.
Roles in the Post-Labor Ecosystem
Makers
Fabricators, engineers, and builders who create tangible assets using Western Canada's manufacturing strengths. These skilled craftspeople apply their expertise to everything from modular homes to spacecraft components.
AI Specialists
Developers who create the artificial intelligence systems that drive business optimization, drone coordination, and cybersecurity. They leverage Vancouver's thriving AI ecosystem to build the cooperative's technological advantage.
Architects
Designers who plan modular communities and space habitats, optimizing for both efficiency and human flourishing. They create the blueprints for self-sufficient living environments on Earth and beyond.
Strategists
Coordinators who oversee governance, acquisition strategy, and network development. They ensure the cooperative maintains its purposeful direction while adapting to changing conditions.
15-Year Vision for Post-Labor Prosperity
Years 1-3: Foundation
Establish cooperative with initial businesses and land
Years 4-7: Expansion
Scale to 50+ members and multiple integrated businesses
Years 8-12: Transformation
Build self-sufficient communities and space capabilities
Years 13-15: Transcendence
Achieve post-labor economy on Earth and beyond
This carefully staged progression builds systematically toward a future where automation provides for essential needs, makers focus on innovation and expansion, and prosperity flows from ownership rather than wages. By Year 15, Team³ aims to demonstrate a functioning post-labor economic model that can be scaled globally.
Join the Vanguard of Post-Labor Economics
Who is Team³ looking for?
We seek action-oriented individuals with expertise in fabrication, AI, robotics, software, construction, architecture, or engineering. The ideal candidate is disillusioned with traditional economic models, believes in post-labor prosperity, and is ready to commit skills, time, or capital to building a cooperative empire.
How does the cooperative structure work?
Team³ operates as a worker-owned cooperative with democratic governance: one member, one vote. Members contribute skills and receive housing, food, and asset shares in return. 80% of profits are reinvested into growth, with 20% allocated to community infrastructure. This structure prioritizes collective prosperity over individual gain.
What are the next steps to get involved?
The journey begins with discreet one-on-one conversations to align your vision with the cooperative's mission. Initial recruitment focuses on Western Canada, with the first member meetings in Vancouver or Calgary. Contact us through secure channels to begin the conversation about your role in building the post-labor future.
Team³ represents more than a business opportunity—it's a strategic response to AI's economic disruption and a pathway to prosperity in the post-labor world. For skilled individuals seeking purpose beyond traditional employment, it offers a chance to build something enduring while securing their own future against automation's uncertain impact.