A newsletter by David Ewart
The Scarcity Shift
The value of human capital in the agentic era
AI is making answers, tasks and output abundant. Does that make people redundant?
Not if you know where the value is moving. When information and answers are abundant, value moves to whatever is still scarce. The Scarcity Shift tracks where that value is going, and what businesses and individuals can do to capture it.
Catch the Shift Subscribe free. One essay a week.The shift in one picture
AI makes the left column cheap and everywhere. Value moves to the right.
AI hands us the fish. Fewer of us are learning how to fish.
We are becoming information rich and knowledge poor. The Scarcity Shift is about rebuilding the knowledge part, for your business and for yourself.
Six threads, one field guide
Each issue pulls on a thread or two. Woven together, they map where human value is going.
Knowledge
What it means to know something when AI can answer anything.
The scarcity shift
What gets cheaper, what gets more valuable, and how to spot it early.
Value
How value is created and transferred when machines do more of the work.
Ownership of outcomes
Who is accountable when AI acts on your behalf, and how to stay in the loop.
Human capital
Shifting roles, new team designs, and who to hire, train and keep.
The human agent
How to reinvent yourself so your value rises with the machines, not against them.
Who it's for
Everyone can lead in the agentic era. The question is the same for all of us: where is the value going, and what can you do about it?
Leading a business
You are adopting AI workflows, redesigning teams, and deciding who to hire, train and keep. You need a strategy built to capitalize on what's becoming scarce, not a stack of tools or agents.
Leading your career
You want to know which of your skills are about to be worth more, which are about to be worth less, and how to build the ones that last.