Your Greatest Asset Is Under Attack

Money Matters

This week is more of a discussion and less about having all the answers…

When I sold disability insurance years ago, we’d tell clients something that stopped them cold: “If you had a money printer in your garage that spit out $100 bills, you’d do everything possible to keep it running. You’d maintain it, never let it run out of ink or paper, make sure the electricity stayed on…or at the very least insure it. This isn’t about insurance…it’s about the printer…that printer is you and your ability to work and earn a paycheck.”

Your earning capacity is your most valuable financial asset. Not your 401k. Not your house equity. Not your investment portfolio. Those things only exist because you can earn money to fund them. Everything flows from your ability to generate income.

And right now, that asset is under direct threat from artificial intelligence and its ability to make everyone more efficient with fewer people in a particular work force.

I’m not talking about some distant science fiction scenario. This is happening right now, accelerating faster than most people realize. A year ago we were just learning about ChatGPT. Today, companies are quietly shrinking workforces through hiring freezes because AI allows remaining employees to do the work of multiple people.

Just recently, I part of a small business acquisition in Georgia. In the past, we would have needed attorneys reviewing lease agreements and operating agreements, accountants auditing financials, investment bankers providing analysis. This time, I fed everything into ChatGPT—lease documents, financial data, competitor analysis, dealer agreements. The scope of work I needed from professionals shrank dramatically. I still used an attorney, but for a fraction of what I would have paid two years ago.

That’s one transaction. Now multiply that across every industry. If you’re an underwriter at a bank, your firm probably needs one person doing what five people did before. If you’re a junior CPA at an accounting firm, your firm might need four people instead of seven. If you’re reviewing real estate contracts as a paralegal, AI is already doing most of that work.

This isn’t about AI taking every job. It’s about AI being a force multiplier—allowing one person to do the work of many. Which means some will lose their ability to print money.

Action Steps

Assess Your Career’s AI Vulnerability