> Because as I grow older, I find I am less and less equipped to keep up with the rate of change that we are undergoing. It also means a lot of uncertainty for the immediate future. If AI takes over my job, will I still be able to compete in some industry somewhere and provide for myself?
I understand this fear, and sympathise with it even though I have multiple income streams.
> I don't want much out of life, but I do want the ability to influence my own personal situation. If we wind up in the UBI-ified, dense urban housing future where AI does all the work and no one owns anything, how much real influence will I have over my life?
Why do you fear "dense" urban housing future? I think most people choose relatively dense environments because that's where all the stuff they want is, but rural areas are cheaper[0], and the kind of future where humans must live on UBI due to lack of economic opportunity is necessarily one where robots do the manual labor such as house building and civil engineering, not just the intellectual jobs like architecture and practicing real estate law.
Likewise, while I can see several possible futures where nobody owns stuff, the tech to make it happen is necessarily also good enough that any random philanthropist who owns just one tiny autofac would find it trivial to give everyone their own personal autofac — "my first wish is infinite wishes" except the magic gene doesn't say "no".
[0] The only reason I'm looking to get somewhere a bit more rural is that the sound insulation in my current place is failing, and I'm right by a busy junction with multiple emergency vehicles passing each day — and the more less built-up areas are the cheap ones. Still the biggest city in Europe, but I'll be surrounded by forest and lakes on most sides within 15 minutes' walk.