A few months ago, I wrote about Elon Musk's prediction that artificial intelligence will eventually make intelligence itself abundant.

He believes the kind of work once performed only by highly trained people will become increasingly cheap and widely available.

Whether he’s right remains to be seen.

But it’s easy to see why so many people immediately jump to the same conclusion: If AI can think, what happens to human jobs?

It’s a familiar fear.

The steam engine threatened craftsmen. The assembly line threatened skilled labor. Computers threatened office workers.

Every technological revolution sparks predictions about what will disappear.

What receives far less attention is what these revolutions demand in return.

If intelligence becomes cheaper, what becomes more valuable?

One answer is hiding inside an American company that's been around since before the Civil War.

Your Rundown for Wednesday, July 15, 2026...

Corning’s Second Act

Founded in 1851, Corning Inc. (GLW) has spent 175 years working with glass and other advanced materials. It survived the transition from kerosene lamps to electric light bulbs, from cathode-ray televisions to smartphone screens. Now it finds itself at the center of another technological revolution.

Because the infrastructure supporting AI increasingly depends on the products Corning makes.

The AI boom relies heavily on fiber-optic networks, which move vast amounts of information through hair-thin strands of ultra-pure glass. Large AI data centers can require miles of fiber to connect servers, buildings and entire campuses.

As technology companies race to build that infrastructure, demand for Corning’s optical fiber, cable and connectivity equipment is rising right alongside it.

That has made Corning a major beneficiary of the AI build-out.

This year, the company announced major supply agreements with Meta, NVIDIA and Amazon. Meta’s agreement is worth up to $6 billion, while NVIDIA has committed to purchases of up to $3.2 billion. Amazon announced a separate multibillion-dollar deal.

Corning says those partnerships will expand domestic fiber-optic manufacturing, support new facilities and expansions in North Carolina and Texas and create thousands of manufacturing, construction and skilled-trade jobs.

Although investors naturally gravitate toward the companies making headlines, every gold rush creates demand for “picks and shovels.”

There’s a broader lesson here: We often think of innovation as the end of an industry. Sometimes, it breathes new life into an old one.

Artificial intelligence, for instance, may live in the digital world, but it depends on an enormous physical one. Data centers don’t appear out of thin air. Someone has to manufacture the glass, string the fiber, pour the concrete, install the cooling systems and keep the lights on.

Those jobs can’t be outsourced to a chatbot.

Perhaps that’s the most American part of this story.

Time and again, industries that seemed destined for decline found new purpose because the next technological leap demanded something they already knew how to do exceptionally well.

Nearly two centuries after opening its doors, a company that once made glass for railroad lanterns is helping build the backbone of artificial intelligence.

Market Rundown for Wednesday, July 15, 2026

S&P 500 futures are up 0.20% to 7,605.

Oil is up 0.60%, just under $80 for a barrel of WTI.

Gold is down 0.15% to $4,062.30 per ounce.

And Bitcoin’s up 0.35% to $64,700.