Average is Over ... Except in the Music Industry

I just finished reading Tyler Cowen's new book Average is Over. I liked it. I tend to like Cowen's work because he has a fairly nonpartisan view of things. He is an economics professor at George Mason University. His writing doesn't infer that our economy is screwed up because of greedy corporations, selfish republicans, or ignorant liberals who need to get government out of the way so the free market can fix everything.

He's unassuming as he tells us where we are and how things are going to be. He doesn't write to scare the reader into voting a particular way (although the picture he paints is rather grim). Instead he tells us what to prepare for.

He basically states that Americans of average abilities and education are going to struggle, along with everyone below them. There is going to be a small group of wealthy people at the top, and the rest of us will be left to scrap. (Well, it's not that bad. He writes a lot about how technology will make it easier, cheaper, and more enjoyable to live with less.)

In addition to reading, I've been listening to a lot of music lately. I like the "Discover" option on Spotify. It suggests music based on what you listen to. It's better than Pandora because I can look at a whole menu of artists and pick which one to listen to, and switch whenever I feel that the artist isn't to my liking.

I like indie bands, but Spotify has turned me into a real music snob. I've discovered amazing groups like Menomena, French Kicks, Kids These Days, and White Denim. These are band that I would have never heard of in the 1990s. You know what the 90s had? Rock Gods like Pearl Jam, U2, and The Red Hot Chilli Peppers that pervaded MTV, top 40 radio, and enormous arenas across the planet. You don't see that anymore. The super band is dead.

Conversely, it's really easy for an obscure, independent band to be discovered through platforms like Spotify. They'll just never be that big. An "average" band is better off now than ever, and popular artists will never be as wealthy as when music distribution was controlled by a few large media corporations.

This is just one industry that contradicts Cowen's prediction, but I wonder how much technology will enable startups that would otherwise have remained dormant. It remains to be seen how much technology will affect the middle class and whether it will be a job killer or a job creator.