I just happened to have picked up a book about exactly this -- Robert B. Reich's The Future of Success (http://www.amazon.com/The-Futu... from my local library's ebook app.
The book dates back to the dot-com boom but it makes much the same points as would apply to the metaverse.
Specifically, he talks about why we're actually working MORE even though we're more productive. And it's not because we need the money! The more money people make, the longer the hours they work! You'd think that if they make a lot of money per hour, they'd cut back on the hours to spend more time with their families, friends, and hobbies. But no.
He says it's because technology is moving so fast that we have to work extra hard to stay on top of it. If we don't, someone else will sweep in and take all our customers.
The end result is dramatically better quality of life for the average person on the planet (a billion people lifted out of subsidence poverty in China alone) but at a cost of higher stress to the folks involved in building all this out.
Obviously, if its gets too bad we'll do something about it. If folks start keeling over from stress, or a lot of folks lose their jobs due to economic disruptions, we'll extend safety nets, overtime regulations. As a country, we may be slow to take action, but when we do, our initial instinct is to over react -- then we compromise the hell out of it.
Until then, though, I guess the best any of us can do is try to be prepared, marry a spouse in a different field to diversify risk, reduc our expenses so we can save money for a rainy day, and work on improving timeless personal values that will come in handy in any situation -- leadership skills, sales skills, organization skills, time management, self-disclipline.