On the workers being employed side, anyone who thinks the answer is agriculture, care to explain how many more works agriculture is going to end up employing in the future, based on increased demand for food.

In the not too distant future, when 3 to 6 Billion people own smart-phones then the sale of a $0.25 phone application to insignificant niche audience of 0.05% of the population translates to $375,000 to $750,000; and if you could bring in an "amazingly large" $1.00 from and unbelieveably large 0.5% of the population you earn $15,000,000 to $30,000,000. In an environment like this people can be highly successful targeting a very small niche.

As e-ink gets cheaper and better you will start to see $10 to $25 digital frames that people can hang on their wall each powered by a small solar cell. This will translate into a world where hundreds of millions of people own dozens of picture frames that each have dozens or hundreds of images on them, and these images may change randomly or could be used to change the style of the room at the demand of the user. Artists and photographers will have the opportunity to make a living selling their works for next to nothing to individuals but (due to the lack of overhead) the total amount of money collected per work is far more than most artists could ever dream of.

On leisure time, unless you're sitting around staring at a blank wall you would have difficulty doing something in your spare time which didn't consume the product or service that someone is providing.

I am wondering how viable the business model here will be.  Considering my current personal situation, I am hoping something works out.  I am producing a lot of IP in my spare time, and want to monetize it.

In the short run (the next 5 or so years) I'm not too optimistic simply because the market is still developing and I think that, much like in the dot-com bubble, there is too much investment for the current possible returns and most companies are being run without much of a realistic business model. In the long run though, I believe that digital distribution, low cost manufacturing, and online sales are leading us to a world where companies and individuals can be successful targeting far smaller markets.

I am interested to see what would happen if there is localized Just-In-Time manufacturing based on nano-technology with programmable matter.  Also, I have observed that, the past 10-15 years or so, we have witnessed two bubbles, and now the entire economy only gets a shot when there are bubbles.  In industries where jobs called for specialized skill that take multiple years to acquire, it does havoc to the supply of employees when the industry is built on a bubble.

I cannot answer that much at all... I was merely pointing out that (of all fields) agriculture is generally not one that people enter expecting a life of luxury.  On your quesion, though, statistically, one "farmer" feeds hundreds more people today than 200 years ago.  While that will be slightly increased - better strains of crops, more efficiency etc., there is only so much food that can be produced by a given amount of land and only so many people needed to harvest such land.  As such, the increased demand will not (IMO) be sufficient to employ enough people to solve your posted predicament.

Im pretty sure the big problem will start when were at a point where we dont have any choice beside changing our way of living, and changing it radically. There will be affluent persons who will not want to leave their life of luxury or die. Lets hope we can change our mentality before that. Its been a while already that buying cheap oil shouldnt even be an option.

Don't be so quick to assume ignorance in anyone who disagrees with you. I grew up on a hobby farm, and we frequently had holidays to an actual farm. The guy who ran the place hated government subsidies, was making bank (as the phrase goes) without them. He paid his workers well (most were family, the rest became like family, my dad worked there for a year, and I grew close enough to consider this guy as an uncle)

If you are making a loss in the agriculture sector, you are farming wrong. Here's a checklist of things you might be doing

1) Overloading your fields - sure, you can squeeze 10% more now but you will fuck up your land and thus your future. If you consider farming to be risky, this is certainly what you are doing wrong.

2) Planting the wrong thing. If you grow rice in Australia you are a moron.

3) Using outdated and inefficient methods.

Perhaps you should take your own advise concerning assumptions and consider that your experience does not exptrapolate well to all farming operations.  What if you are growing properly, rotating crops as you should etc. but then a hail storm decimates your crop, but you still have bills to pay?  Insurance does not cover it all.  What about smut (assuming you know what that is) because some idiot down the road was not careful.  You cannot tell what the weather will do, and it IS a gamble.  Now, hopefully you have enough finanaces in reserve to weather the storm (pun intended), but that only goes so far. 

Also, if you know even half as much as you claim to, then you know how expensive modern farming equipment can be.  Those are some heavy bills to pay in hard times, and not all farms are even large enough to hire and pay workers. 

So kindly stop acting as if you know everything about agriculture.  Not all struggling farmers are doing so because they broke one your overly simplified rules.  Sometimes, luck and nature do fall into the equation.

I never claimed to know everything about agriculture. That is why I say things like "Using outdated and inefficient methods." instead of perfectly describing what the worst and best methods are. I do, however, know enough to be carrying on this conversation. You were rude to crazymann for no good reason and are being kind of rude to me. 

If a hail storm decimated a farmers crops, as you say, they should be able to cope very easily  - 1/10th of your crops wouldn't be all that significant. Regardless, how frequent are hailstorms of that severity in an area in which it's sensible to grow crops without planning for it?

As for your assertion that there is some capital cost associated with opening a farm. This is true, but not particularly important. There is capital (and risk) associated with any business. If you farm properly, the risks associated with it are fairly minimal. One such example of good practice is the planting of trees in and amonsgt your crops. These have many advantages, such as providing the crops with protection from wind (and even hail), vastly reducing soil erosion (ie making you need much less fertiliser), and they can be used as a source of sustainable timber, providing income even after a hailstorm or something. Other ways to diversify can also help to minimise risk.

Bookstore owners don't get taxpayer funding to sell unpopular books, and they don't get taxpayer funding if they overload their shelves and the books all fall down. I don't see why you would want farmers to get these things.