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TL;DR
A November 3, 2026, article uses agriculture’s long decline as a case study for thinking about AI and work. It reports that farming’s share of U.S. employment fell from about 73.7% around 1800 to roughly 1.5% today, while food production rose; its suggestion that AI could automate up to 90% of a sector is the author’s thesis, not an established forecast.
Thorsten Meyer’s November 3, 2026, article uses agriculture’s long move away from human labor to examine what AI may mean for work, reporting that about 73.7% of the U.S. labor force worked in agriculture around 1800, compared with roughly 1.5% today. The historical account shows that a shrinking farm workforce did not mean less food, but it does not establish how quickly AI will change other sectors or how many jobs it may displace.
Meyer traces farming’s transformation to a series of changes rather than one sudden invention: improved tools, industrial fertilizer and higher-yield crops. One early example is a steel plough made by blacksmith John Deere in 1837, which, according to the company’s account, shed sticky Midwestern soil more effectively than earlier designs. Mechanical reapers, threshers and tractors followed, although the article leaves those developments largely to a later installment.
The article also describes the role of fertilizer. Fritz Haber filed a patent in 1908 for synthesizing ammonia from its elements; industrial production made nitrogen fertilizer available at scale. Later, short-straw wheat varieties developed in the Green Revolution could support heavier grain yields, especially when paired with fertilizer and irrigation. Meyer cites Indian official statistics showing wheat production rising from 12.3 million tonnes in 1964–65 to 26.4 million tonnes in 1971–72, then reaching a third advance estimate of 117.5 million tonnes for 2024–25.
The author’s central historical point is that agriculture’s share of employment fell well before the total number of farm workers did. In the United States, the farm workforce continued to grow until about 1910, reaching an estimated 11.8 million people, even as farming became a smaller part of the overall economy. Meyer says Germany’s agricultural workforce remained between 8 million and 10 million from 1882 to 1939 while agriculture’s employment share fell from 43% to 25%. These figures suggest that other sectors absorbed workers over time, but the article does not claim that every displaced worker moved directly into a new job.
What Farm History Can—and Cannot—Show
Agriculture offers a substantial historical case for studying labor-saving change: a sector that once employed most workers in some economies now employs a small share in highly industrialized countries. Meyer points to the contrast between roughly 1.5% of U.S. workers in agriculture and about 43% in India, alongside an International Labour Organization estimate that 928 million people worldwide worked in agriculture in 2025, or about one in four workers. The shift is far from complete globally.
The article also challenges the idea that fewer farmers necessarily mean less food. It reports that global cereal harvests grew 4.2-fold from 1961 while the population grew 2.7-fold, and that U.S. farm output in 2023 was nearly three times its 1948 level with only a small rise in total inputs. Those comparisons are presented as evidence of rising output alongside technological change; they do not mean that all regions or households have equal access to food, or that agriculture’s experience predicts outcomes in every occupation.
For readers considering AI and employment, the distinction matters. The farm record shows that productivity can rise as the share of workers in an industry falls, but the transition unfolded over generations and involved tools, biological research, infrastructure and policy as well as technology. Meyer’s suggestion that AI could make up to 90% of a sector automated within a decade or a few decades is explicitly his thesis, not a measured result or a settled forecast.
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A Long, Uneven Agricultural Shift
The U.S. estimate for 1800 comes from economic historian Stanley Lebergott’s historical series, published by the U.S. Census Bureau. It counts a labor force of 1.9 million people aged 10 and older, including about 530,000 enslaved people, with 1.4 million in agriculture. The figures before 1840 are estimates rather than census counts; the same series puts the 1810 agricultural share even higher, at 83.7%. Meyer therefore uses “about three in four” as a broad description rather than treating 73.7% as a precise census result.
Other countries show similarly high historical shares, though the data are not directly identical. Economic historians reconstruct Japan’s primary-sector share at about 85% in 1872; that category included farming, forestry and fishing. China’s official series begins in 1952 with 83.5% of employed people in the primary sector, while India’s 1951 census counted cultivators and agricultural laborers as 69.7% of workers. Germany’s first official occupational census, in 1882, recorded 43.4% in agriculture and forestry; Meyer notes that women helping on family farms were undercounted.
The figures describe different countries, dates and statistical categories, not one synchronized global transition. They do, however, place the present AI debate against a history in which the movement away from farm work was gradual and shaped by multiple innovations.
““Farming changed in steps, not in one leap.””
— Thorsten Meyer, author of the November 3, 2026, article
Limits of the AI Comparison
The historical figures establish changes in agricultural employment and output, but they do not measure AI’s present or future effect on jobs. The article offers no sector-by-sector forecast, method or evidence for its proposed possibility of automation reaching up to 90% in a sector. The timeframe—“a decade or a few decades”—is broad, and the author identifies the statement as a thesis.
It is also unclear how the benefits and costs of future automation would be distributed. The agricultural comparisons do not show which workers found new jobs, how long that took, or what happened to wages and working conditions. Nor do they establish that employment changes in offices, factories or other sectors will follow the same path as farming.
The Series Turns to Other Work
Meyer presents this article as Episode 2 of “Work After Work”, a series comparing field, factory and office work. The source says Episode 3 will cover mechanical reapers, threshers and tractors, extending the account of changes to farm labor. That installment may provide more detail on how machinery altered production; no publication date is specified.
For now, the article’s main contribution is a historical comparison, not a forecast of AI job losses. Readers should treat the farming record as evidence that technological change can reshape employment over long periods, while recognizing that its pace and effects in other industries remain unsettled.
Key Questions
What is the article’s main development?
Thorsten Meyer’s November 3, 2026, article uses agriculture’s decline as a share of employment to discuss how AI could affect work. It is a historical report and argument, not a new employment study or a verified AI forecast.
The article cites an estimate of 73.7% around 1800 and says agriculture accounts for roughly 1.5% of U.S. workers today. The early figure is a historical estimate, not a census count, and the comparison spans more than two centuries.
Did fewer farm workers mean less food?
Not in the output comparisons Meyer cites. The article reports that global cereal harvests grew 4.2-fold from 1961 while population grew 2.7-fold, and that U.S. farm output in 2023 was nearly three times its 1948 level. These figures do not establish that food access is equal everywhere.
Does the article predict that AI will automate 90% of jobs?
No. Meyer says automation could reach up to 90% within a decade or a few decades, but labels that statement his thesis, not a fact. The article supplies no detailed method or sector-specific evidence to confirm it.
What is expected next in the series?
The source identifies Episode 3 as a discussion of mechanical reapers, threshers and tractors. It does not give a publication date.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
