The city had once been a place of stark inequalities, where tower blocks loomed over crumbling terraces, where glass-fronted offices cast long shadows over food banks. But the city fathers had a vision. They spoke of inclusive growth, a tide that would lift all boats, where prosperity would be shared, and wealth would no longer be the privilege of the few.
And so, they set to work.
A promising vision deaf to social standing
Investments flowed into infrastructure, technology, and innovation. New businesses emerged, drawing talent from all corners of the city. Public–private partnerships flourished. There were apprenticeships, upskilling initiatives, and promises that this time, the wealth would not merely trickle down, it would spread.
And, for a while, it did.
Unemployment fell. Wages rose. Even those on the margins found themselves drawn into an economy that, at last, seemed to be working for them.
But something else was happening, too.
Inclusive or disproportionate growth?
The city’s wealthiest, its tech leaders, its financiers, its visionaries, those who had been instrumental in making inclusive growth possible, grew wealthier still. The new prosperity was not a redistribution but an expansion, an acceleration. Those who had capital invested it. Those who had power leveraged it. Those who owned the platforms, the algorithms, the networks, they became indispensable.
At first, the changes were subtle. Fewer workers were needed as automation took over routine jobs. Welfare systems were modernised, streamlined, digitised, and outsourced to corporate partners with an interest in ‘efficiency’. Rent controls were abandoned in favour of ‘smart markets’ that responded dynamically to ‘demand’, though demand seemed to be concentrated in fewer and fewer hands.
Landlords became property conglomerates. Small businesses became gig-economy nodes, feeding into vast logistical networks and labour matching platforms controlled by a handful of billionaires. Universal Basic Income was trialled but soon became permanent, a way of managing those no longer required by the economy, a subsidy for those excluded from growth.
And still, the leaders celebrated. The data looked good. GDP per capita had risen. The median income was higher than ever. Investment in education had produced a new generation of entrepreneurs. “This,” they declared, “is the proof that inclusive growth works!”
But by then, something had shifted.
Society’s upper crust retreats
The city was wealthier, but its wealth was no longer shared. Inequality had widened, not because the poor had grown poorer, no, they had never had it so good, but because the rich had ascended to heights previously unimaginable.
And at those heights, they began to withdraw.
At first, they simply moved to private compounds, where security was tighter, where automation handled more of their needs. Then, their presence in the city diminished entirely. They no longer required local services, medical care was provided through personalised biotech, food was lab-grown to order, education was AI-driven and exclusive to those deemed worthy of it.
They no longer required other people.
Humanity lacks a human hand
Politics became redundant; the most successful technocrats replaced governance with management. City leaders, once the architects of inclusive growth, found themselves relegated to ceremonial roles, their decisions overridden by algorithms optimised for efficiency.
And then, one by one, the city’s leaders disappeared, replaced by spokespeople for the System, an entity without ideology, without human bias, without need for government.
For those left behind, life was comfortable, so long as they did not ask for more. Their needs were met, but their agency was gone. They were cared for, provided for, entertained, but they no longer shaped the world.
The promise had been growth for all. And in a way, they had delivered.
But what they had built was not a city.
It was a machine.
