Op-ed: Will AI take your job in a small town? It depends on who you ask
Albert Qian, founder of Albert’s List.
– I was born and raised in Silicon Valley and now spend much of my time working remotely from Paso Robles. That creates an unusual perspective.
One moment I am hearing conversations about AI agents, automation, and billion-dollar startup ideas. The next, I’m feeding my niece’s pig for 4H, overhearing chatter about the harvest at The Loading Chute, and admiring the rugged practicality of a town that keeps humming no matter what Silicon Valley declares revolutionary this week.
People in Silicon Valley often sit around conference rooms trying to invent solutions to problems most people did not realize existed. I know this because I have sat through startup pitch events wondering where some of these ideas even came from. Sometimes those ideas become billion-dollar companies. Sometimes they quietly disappear six months later.
Still, artificial intelligence is no longer some distant science-fiction concept reserved for tech workers in San Francisco.
You do not have to walk very far these days to hear someone talking about AI. It is on television. It is all over social media. Students are using ChatGPT to study. Small business owners are experimenting with AI-generated marketing. Parents are asking AI tools to help explain the slang their kids are suddenly using. People are building vacation itineraries, organizing their thoughts, summarizing documents, and even writing memoirs with tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.
And now, somehow, someone in a town long associated with cows and wine is writing an opinion column about artificial intelligence. What has the world come to?
The truth is that AI has enormous potential, but it is important to separate what the technology can actually do today from the marketing surrounding it.
If you listen to some corners of Silicon Valley, you would think artificial intelligence is about to replace every worker in America by next Tuesday while simultaneously fixing traffic and cooking dinner. Venture capital money is pouring into AI companies, and tech firms are racing to convince the world that massive change is arriving tomorrow morning.
Some of that change will absolutely happen. Some of it will not.
That does not mean people should ignore AI entirely. Like computers, smartphones, and the internet before it, this technology is going to find its way into everyday life at some level whether people like it or not.
But here on the Central Coast, AI will probably look different than the doomsday scenarios people see online.
It may help wineries organize inventory or improve marketing. It may assist office workers with scheduling and communication. It may help local businesses build websites or advertisements without needing large budgets. It may become a useful companion for blue-collar workers looking up information while out in the field.
But no, a chatbot probably is not fixing a rural water tank anytime soon — though I am sure someone in Silicon Valley is already trying to raise venture capital for it.
That is because places like Paso Robles still operate on something technology struggles to replicate: practical reality.
People here help their neighbors. They gather downtown at the gazebo for conversations that matter. They support local businesses through difficult years. Technology moves quickly, but try telling communities like this that an app can replace traditions built over generations or replicate the social fabric of a small town, and most people will laugh at you.
What concerns me more than AI itself is whether people — especially younger people — are prepared to adapt alongside it.
Recent college graduates are entering one of the strangest job markets in years. Entry-level hiring has slowed in many industries. Employers are becoming more selective. AI tools are changing expectations around productivity and communication.
That sounds intimidating, but history suggests something important: America has gone through technological shifts before.
The internet changed work. Smartphones changed communication. Automation changed manufacturing. Every major technological shift disrupts certain jobs while creating entirely new opportunities somewhere else.
The people who tend to succeed are usually the ones who stay adaptable.
So if you are raising kids or mentoring young people, the lesson may not be to fear artificial intelligence. The lesson may be to build skills that technology struggles to replace: communication, resilience, creativity, judgment, leadership, and the ability to work well with others.
Learn how to solve problems. Learn how to think clearly. Learn how to communicate. Learn how to keep going when things change unexpectedly.
Those skills tend to survive every economic cycle.
And perhaps that is the real story here. Even in small towns across rural California, people are beginning to wrestle with the same questions facing the rest of the world:
What changes?
What stays human?
And how do we adapt together?
-Albert Qian, founder of Albert’s List
