Even the bleakest accounts of the future are more additive than subtractive. They assume the invention of new things and not the loss of things that already exist. The torment in 1984 comes via two-way "telescreens" and clandestine recording systems. Robert Harris's new novel, The Second Sleep, set in a boggy Dark Ages to come, is exceptional in this regard. It grants that time brings stasis and backsliding as often as progress.
Here, then, is a subtractive vision of the future. It is not my base case but it is ever more plausible. Few will find it heart-rending stuff but I offer it with a certain dread. It could spell the end of my way of life, and perhaps yours.
First, the humbling of WeWork spreads to similarly modish companies. Recession and labour laws sap the valuations of Uber, Deliveroo and other services that lubricate urban life without turning a profit. Perhaps it ends their viability outright. At the same time, anguish about climate change leads to much higher taxation and even rationing of air travel. Flying reverts to its mid-20th century status as a giddy treat. At least in the west, it becomes politically impossible to build or expand an airport. Meanwhile, the froideur between Airbnb and tourist cities escalates until the firm is garrotted in red tape. The loss of competition in holiday lodging brings about an increase in hotel prices.
In lots of little ways, the costs of a mobile, frictionless life go up. Disposable incomes fail to rise as fast. Over time, a sort of gumming up of the world takes place for all but the rich.
We could be living through the last years of the middle-class world citizen. And the demise of this character might have little or nothing to do with populism. Tougher migration laws would contribute, no doubt, and so would a breakdown in world trade. But these eventualities are discussed often enough. Nor do I need them to make my case. Even if we assume "just" the commercial shocks mentioned above, life would already be materially different for millions.