History Main / ObsoleteOccupation

* ''Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are?'', by Creator/DrSeuss, featured several characters in these types of jobs, such as the guy who has to cross T's and dot I's at an "I and T Factory".

* ''Literature/{{Gone}}'' has pretty much the exact computer programmer example mentioned in the description - Jack is an expert at computers (though it's not his job, given that he is [[TeenageWasteland a kid like everyone else]], in a DomedHometown shut off from any possible internet access. He almost manages to get the internet working anyway until the event of the second book leads to the local power plant failing, making his job completely useless as everyone's computers just slowly run out of battery.

* ''Literature/TheTwoBadMice'' features two [[LivingToys sentient dolls]] named Jane and Lucinda. It notes that Jane was allegedly the cook, but she never got a chance to do any cooking, since the dollhouse came with toy food, and they never needed to eat it (being wooden dolls) anyway.

--> -- '''[[NoNameGiven The Chancellor]]''', ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'', "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteMan The Obsolete Man]]"

* In ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', a 20th-century financier in ''[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E25TheNeutralZone The Neutral Zone]]'' is awakened to find that his profession is worthless in the Federation's post-scarcity economy.
** {{Subverted|Trope}} in the novels set in this universe, where he has become the ambassador to the Ferengi (who appreciate his financial savvy), and later on becomes the Federation Secretary of Commerce.

* ''Series/ThirtyRock'': Jack once asked Liz (a TV writer) what use she would be in a post-apocalyptic world. She said "traveling bard", he came back with "radiation canary".

** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS5E153TheBrainCenterAtWhipples The Brain Center at Whipple's]]" has an entire factory's worth of workers declared outdated as the titular Whipple outfits his factory with ever-increasing amounts of automation until Whipple finds himself replaced by [[Film/ForbiddenPlanet Robbie the Robot]].
** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteMan The Obsolete Man]]": Romney Wordsworth is a librarian in a dystopic future that bans books. Anyone "Obsolete" is sentenced to death, which sparks the plot.

--> -- '''[[NoNameGiven The Chancellor]]''', ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteMan The Obsolete Man]]"

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone'':

[[caption-width-right:300:It was easier being a viking 1000 years ago]]

->Since there are no more books, Mr. Wordsworth, there are no more libraries. And of course it follows that there is very little call for the services of a librarian. Case in point: A minister would tell us that his function is preaching the word of God. And of course it follows that since the State has proven that there is no God, that would make the function of a minister academic as well.

* Subverted in ''Literature/TheRestaurantAtTheEndOfTheUniverse'' - the inhabitants of Golgafrincham believed that telephone sanitization was a useless profession and exiled all of their telephone sanitizers, only to be wiped out by an infection contracted from a dirty telephone.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

** Hollis Mason retires from the superhero business so he can dedicate himself to repairing cars - only to find out that Dr. Manhattan can use his superpowers to synthesize massive quantities of lithium for batteries in electric cars, rendering the internal combustion engine obsolete. When the story opens, Mason is managing an auto repair shop specializing in vintage cars, which is fast going out of business.

[[folder:Film — Animated]]

[[folder:Film — Live Action]]

* In the original ''[[Film/JurassicPark1993 Jurassic Park]]'', Alan Grant muses on what the creation of cloned dinosaurs means for his field of paleontology:
-->'''Ellie:''' So, what are you thinking?\\

-->From this adventure we, I think, may learn
-->That for life's daily needs much learning is not wanted;
-->But that to every man the power to earn
-->Food by his labour has been freely granted.

* ''Literature/WorldWarZ'': after the ZombieApocalypse, the United States government classify several professions such as lawyers and entertainers as F-6, to be retrained.
-->''The first labor survey stated clearly that over 65 percent of the present civilian workforce were classified F-6, possessing no valued vocation. We required a massive job retraining program. In short, we needed to get a lot of white collars dirty.''

[[folder:Mythology and Folklore]]

[[folder:Theater]]

* In ''Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick'', the unnamed Shadowdancer has this problem. His class's special ability allows him to teleport between shadows, but because his universe is a stick-figure webcomic, shadows are only drawn when they'd be dramatically appropriate. Right after arguing with Redaxe about this, they are both caught in an explosion. Luckily for them, the explosion was dramatic enough to cast shadows, [[ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman so the Shadowdancer was able to teleport them both to safety]].

-->''PAST''
-->'''Mario:''' Well, I write blogs for a living.
-->'''Employer:''' Ha ha ha! You can't make a living doing that!
-->''FUTURE''
-->'''Mario:''' Well, I write blogs for a living.
-->'''Employer:''' Ha ha ha! You still ''write''?!

* UsefulNotes/{{Mongolia}} used to have one of the largest navies in the world when the Khans were in charge. Then their empire weakened and after foreign occupations, their country was already landlocked upon independence. It was reinstated during the Soviet rule with the relatively simple task of transporting oil in Lake Khovsgol, which takes less time than going around it. When communism fell, they stopped doing even that. In modern times, they only have sailors and ships in single digits. The lake they're guarding...is completely inland.[[note]]Even though they have another lake that they share with Russia, which is their only international water border.[[/note]] Also, apparently only one of their sailors can swim. Though they don't fulfill the usual roles of a navy anymore, they now guide tourists instead. Read [[http://nowiknow.com/mongolias-strange-and-unnecessary-and-really-small-navy/ more]] [[https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/09/the-landlocked-navy-of-mongolia.html here]].

* The "extinct" line in ''[[Film/JurassicPark1993 Jurassic Park]]'' (see above) was a reference to stop motion animator Phil Tippett calling himself "extinct" when he found out that the dinosaurs were going to be created with CGI. However, Tippett was kept on as a consultant, leading to his memetic "dinosaur supervisor" credit. After ''Jurassic Park'', his company, Creator/TippettStudio, changed its speciality from stop motion to CGI.

** "The Brain Center at Whipple's" has an entire factory's worth of workers declared outdated as the titular Whipple outfits his factory with ever-increasing amounts of automation until Whipple finds himself replaced by [[Film/ForbiddenPlanet Robbie the Robot]].

In most circumstances, their occupation would be pretty useful, but in theirs, not so much. Maybe the relevant technology is obsolete now, hasn't been invented yet, or simply doesn't function in a way that needs those services. Why they don't just find another job isn't always addressed.

* ''Literature/IslandInTheSeaOfTime'': One of the major factors fueling Lisketter's Revolt was the fact that Pamela Lisketter and her fellow activists realized that a bunch of environmentalists weren't going to have much influence in a world where the environment wasn't in any particular danger yet. As the new government forms, she and her followers find themselves increasingly displaced in favor of more useful people like Captain Alston (an experienced Coast Guard officer) and Jared Cofflin (a war veteran and police chief), and thus try to kill Alston and kidnap Cofflin's wife in an attempt to stop what they see as a military takeover of "their" island.

* ''VideoGame/QuestForGloryIV'': PlayedForLaughs. A minor character named Ivan is a professional elephant herder... but the game is set in Mordavia, a wooded mountain valley smack in the middle of the {{Uberwald}}. According to Ivan, at least, elephants were once endemic to Mordavia, but have migrated away during his lifetime due to supernatural calamities plaguing the valley.

Compare to ObsoleteMentor (whose skills, rather than their profession, are obsolete), ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything (who simply don't bother with performing their job), and ADegreeInUseless. If a job has become obsolete as a result of technological process and automation, see JobStealingRobot. Often the case with robots in the case of HumanitysWake, leading to UnfulfilledPurposeMisery. May also include a heavy dose of LuddWasRight. Related to LightspeedLeapfrog (space explorers on a SleeperShip discover that FTL has been invented while they were out, making them useless).

* ''ComicBook/ElfQuest'': Winnowill was a healer who went insane because, among other things, her people became so safe that she had no purpose anymore.shop specializing in vintage cars, which is fast going out of business.

* In ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', a 20th-century financier is awakened to find that his profession is worthless in the Federation's post-scarcity economy.

** However, this is later subverted in ''Film/JurassicParkIII'', in which Alan declares that the Jurassic Park dinosaurs are "theme park monsters" that contribute nothing to genuine paleontology.

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone'':
** "The Brain Center at Whipple's" has an entire factory's worth of workers declared outdated as the titular Whipple outfits his factory with ever-increasing amounts of automation until Whipple finds himself replaced by [[Film/ForbiddenPlanet Robbie the Robot]].
** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteMan The Obsolete Man]]": Romney Wordsworth is a librarian in a dystopic future that bans books. Anyone "Obsolete" is sentenced to death, which sparks the plot.
* ''Series/ThatMitchellAndWebbLook'': One sketch featured a stone chiseler worried about the upcoming Bronze Age.
* ''Series/ThirtyRock'': Jack once asked Liz (a TV writer) what use she would be in a post-apocalyptic world. She said "traveling bard", he came back with "radiation canary".

* ''Series/BabylonFive'' recounts the story of the guarded flower from Mythology and Folklore in the episode "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS05E10ATragedyOfTelepaths A Tragedy of Telepaths]]" but with an in-universe event where Londo was the one who discovered the pointless sentry.
* One episode of ''Series/NewAmsterdam2018'' sees Max searching through the hospital's staff to locate employees whose jobs have become outdated, promising to reassign anyone who comes forward.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutronBoyGenius'': In "Fundemonium", Jimmy's father said that he planned to move the family to another city. He explained that this is because he is a car salesman, but everybody in town already has a car, so he has no customers.
* In the ChristmasSpecial ''WesternAnimation/HowMurraySavedChristmas'', Murray used to be the mascot for National Milkman Day; when milk deliveries became obsolete, so did the holiday celebrating them, and Murray ended up running a diner at Stinky Cigars, the town where other, still relevant holiday mascots live.

* The "extinct" line in ''[[Film/JurassicPark1993 Jurassic Park]]'' (see above) was a reference to stop motion animator Phil Tippett calling himself "extinct" when he found that the dinosaurs were going to be created with CGI. However, Tippett was kept on as a consultant, leading to his memetic "dinosaur supervisor" credit. After ''Jurassic Park'', his company, Creator/TippettStudio, changed its speciality from stop motion to CGI.

--> -- '''[[NoNameGiven The Chancellor]]''', ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteManThe Obsolete Man]]"

** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E65TheObsoleteManThe Obsolete Man]]": Romney Wordsworth is a librarian in a dystopic future that bans books. Anyone "Obsolete" is sentenced to death, which sparks the plot.

* In the ''Literature/{{Worldwar}}'' series, the Lizards' empire has been unified for millennia, so not only are most military professions obsolete there (aside from those sent in the conquest fleet against Earth) but so are jobs like ambassador and interpreter (as their empire's political unification also resulted in linguistic unification).

--> -- '''[[NoNameGiven The Chancellor]]''', ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episode "The Obsolete Man"

** "The Obsolete Man". Romney Wordsworth is a librarian in a dystopic future that bans books.

* {{Parodied|Trope}} and [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]] in ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'', in which one of the many random things mentioned about the galaxy is a planet that reached utopia and summarily sent everybody with a superfluous job (such as "phone sanitiser") into exile? and then everybody in said utopia died of an epidemic caused [[ForWantOfANail by unsanitised telephones]].

* In the ''Literature/{{Worldwar}}'' series, the Lizards' empire has been unified for millennia, so not only are military professions obsolete but so are jobs like ambassador and interpreter (as their empire's political unification also resulted in linguistic unification).

* {{Parodied|Trope}} and [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]] in ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'', in which one of the many random things mentioned about the galaxy is a planet that reached utopia and summarily sent everybody with a superfluous job (such as "phone sterilizer") into exile? and then everybody in said utopia died of an epidemic caused [[ForWantOfANail by unsterilized telephones]].

[[folder:Film: Animated]]

[[folder:Film: Live Action]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

* An episode of the ''Young Animator's Project'' anime series concerns a salesman of oil lamps, lamp oil, and oil lamp accessories who became prosperous by being the first to bring oil lamps to his rural village. Twenty years later, the newly invented electrical lights come to Japan, and he faces instant ruin because no one needs his inventory or specialized skills anymore. [[spoiler:He resolves to change with the times, and moves into another sales field.]]

* In ''Franchise/{{Superman}} Family'' #200, a story set in the then distant future of 2000 has the owner/operator of "Miller's New Cars" who has sold exactly one of his gasoline-powered automobiles in the last year; everyone else drives the new electrics. (And the buyer turns out to be someone who hates all modern things.)
* ''ComicBook/ElfQuest'': Winnowill was a healer who went insane because, among other things, her people became so safe that she had no purpose anymore.

Compare to ObsoleteMentor (whose skills, rather than their profession, is obsolete), ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything (who simply don't bother with performing their job), and ADegreeInUseless. If a job has become obsolete as a result of technological process and automation, see JobStealingRobot. Often the case with robots in the case of HumanitysWake, leading to UnfulfilledPurposeMisery. May also include a heavy dose of LuddWasRight. Related to LightspeedLeapfrog (space explorers on a SleeperShip discover that FTL has been invented while they were out, making them useless).

* The home-appliance company Maytag built a long line of commercials out of this trope. Their claim was that Maytag appliances are so well-built that no one would ever ''need'' to call the Maytag repairman.

** Jon Osterman (Dr. Manhattan) was going to follow his father in the watch repair business until his father read about the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Osterman Sr. decided then and there that watch repair is an obsolete profession and insisted that his son goes into something with a future. Ironically, after Osterman loses his humanity, he decides to become a Celestial Watchmaker (i.e., a god to some people he's going to go create).

* ''ComicBook/ElfQuest'': Winnowill was a healer that went insane because, among other things, her people became so safe that she had no purpose anymore.

* ''Literature/{{Gone}}'' has pretty much the exact computer programmer example mentioned in the description - Jack is an expert at computers (though it's not his job, given that he is [[TeenageWasteland a kid like everyone else]], in a DomedHometown shut off from any possible internet access. He almost manages to get the internet working anyway until the event of the second book lead to the local power plant failing, making his job completely useless as everyone's computers just slowly run out of battery.

* In Creator/MackReynolds' novella ''Mercenary'', America has adopted a hereditary caste system in the future that has resulted in vast numbers of people unemployed by advancing technology and not allowed to retrain unless they enlist in one of the limited corporate wars that serve as mass entertainment. Protagonist Joe Mauser was born into the cobbler caste, shoe repair division, after mass production made it cheaper to buy new shoes.
* The Creator/JeanDeLaFontaine fable "The Merchant, the Noble, the Shepherd and the Prince" has the titular men washed up on the New World after a shipwreck and decide to start earning money so they can get home. The merchant says he'll teach arithmetic, the prince legislation and politics, and the noble heraldry. The shepherd points out that even if they did find people willing to pay them to learn such things, they'd still only get paid at the end of the month, and promptly goes into the woods to gather firewood for sale.

* ''Literature/AMillionAdventures'': Alice meet a chimney sweeper who complains he had to spend the last eighteen years training mountain climbers - not a single working chimney is left on Earth.

** "The Brain Center at Whipple's" has an entire factory's worth of workers declared outdated as the titular Whipple outfits his factory with ever increasing amounts of automation, until Whipple finds himself replaced by [[Film/ForbiddenPlanet Robbie the Robot]].

* ''Series/BabylonFive'' recounts the story of the guarded flower from Mythology and Folkore on the episode "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS05E10ATragedyOfTelepaths A Tragedy of Telepaths]]" but with an in-universe event where Londo was the one who discovered the pointless sentry.

* In William Inge's play ''The Dark at the Top of the Stairs'', Rubin Flood is a harness salesman in the 1920s, when the horse and buggy is fast becoming extinct.

* ''VideoGame/CityBuildingSeries'': Once a city's economy is up and running, a lot of jobs become pointless as they're only meant to keep the unemployment statistic down rather than massively increase production (which in turn would require huge amounts of storage space), as trade is restricted to a certain amount of goods per year. It's actually a much easier problem to deal with than the feedback loop of a CriticalStaffingShortage (lack of workers means less services, meaning housing devolves, meaning less workers, meaning...).
** In {{VideoGame/Pharaoh}}, construction guilds (stonecarvers, bricklayers, carpenters etc.) disappear from the build list once all monument work is complete. Fortunately, work camps are always available since they also provide floodplain farm workers and can be used to provide lots of jobs in a relatively small space.
** VideoGame/ZeusMasterOfOlympus lets you choose when to muster troops, towers and ships or demobilize them. This reduces unemployment even if there's no enemy to fight.

* ''WebVideo/GloveAndBoots'': Discussed in the episode ''"Top 10 reasons why Time Travelling is no good"'', when Fafa points out how you can't get a job in the past or future with your current job skills. Then Mario goes to provide an example.

-->'''Mario:''' And for my hobby, I write blogs for a living.

-->'''Mario:''' And for my hobby, I write blogs for a living.
-->'''Employer:''' Ha ha ha! You still write?!

* ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones'': In "Arthur Quarry's Dance Class", Fred and Barney join Joe Rockhead's volunteer fire department. Joe admitted that there was no need for a FD in Bedrock, since there was nothing to burn in a community where everything is made of stone. But by staging alarm drills in the evenings, the guys were free to go bowling, play pool, etc.

* UsefulNotes/{{Mongolia}} used to have one of the largest navies in the world when the Khans were in charge. Then their empire weakened and after foreign occupations, their country was already landlocked upon independence. It was reinstated during the Soviet rule with the relatively simple task of transporting oil in Lake Khovsgol, which takes less time than going around it. When communism fell, they stopped doing even that. In modern times, they only have sailors and ships in single digits. The lake they're guarding...is completely inland.[[note]]Even though they have another lake which they share with Russia, which is their only international water border.[[/note]] Also, apparently only one of their sailors can swim. Though they don't fulfill the usual roles of a navy anymore, they now guide tourists instead. Read [[http://nowiknow.com/mongolias-strange-and-unnecessary-and-really-small-navy/ more]] [[https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/09/the-landlocked-navy-of-mongolia.html here]].
* Countries which suddenly become landlocked can see naval officers and technicians becoming this trope.[[note]]Not all navies of landlocked countries are pointless. They can have rivers or lakes which they share international borders and therefore needs guarding against foreign intruders or smugglers.[[/note]] Miklos Horthy used to be a decent admiral before Hungary became landlocked because of the Treaty of Trianon, along with Georg von Trapp, who had to live off his wife's inheritance.