(Exitmanned, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)
The world is shattered by the revelation that ghosts are real. It's confirmed by everyone, from respected scientists to noted politicians to prominent social media influencers. They all report the same thing. Ghosts really do exist and, what's more, they're extremely common. It is very like there are at least six ghosts within ten feet of you right now, maybe more.
This, of course, has wild implications, one of which being that life after death has been definitively proven. The specific nature of this afterlife, or even whether this is the only one, is completely unknown, but the fact it exists at all leaves everyone shocked.
But even more shocking than their existence was their wide array of industrial applications. It didn't take long to develop technology to control them, and soon ghosts were vital to the world economy. The souls of the dead, it turned out, were a superior source of energy—abundant, clean-burning and portable. A single one could power anything, from a phone to a building, for years at a time before dissipating. A few thousand, compressed together in a tight enough chamber, can power a city.
Ghosts also make the best computer processors. When bound into a chip and exposed to a current, a ghost is capable of making complex calculations much faster than any silicon unit. Scientists explain this is likely because of quantum entanglement taking place on a sub-atomic level, but aren't completely sure. What they do know, however, is that ghosts in the machine enable practically infinite memory and processing power, which allows science to advance dramatically.
Certain spirits can even be used in manufacturing, mining and other physical jobs. While poltergeists—ghosts capable of affecting objects in the living world—are less common, there are still millions of them around the world available for work. Soon poltergeists are not haunting creepy mansions or suburban television sets. They are bound to assembly lines, producing finished products all day and all night. They wander the streets, picking up garbage thrown out by the living. They wash dishes and mop floors and unclog toilets. But they do not, under any circumstances, haunt.
And--because of course--military forces around the world use ghosts in a variety of inhuman weapons of war. Reserved for these purposes are the most vengeful of spirits, the most violent, the most hateful. They are dropped from planes onto enemy armies or, more commonly, civilian populations. If you've ever seen a horror movie, you know what their effect is.
( "Navajo power plant" by bass_nroll is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. )
No one knows what the ghosts think of all this, or if they can even think at all. Few have ever bothered to ask, and for the ones that did the only answers they seem to get back are “OoooOoo!” or “AaaaaaAhhhhhh!” or “Uuuuuhhhhoooo.” One person with a Ouija board said a ghost told him “My soul has been chained to this Earth, please release me for my existence has become one of unending misery and pain” but no one has ever been able to replicate the result and the incident faded into the realm of urban legend.
Ghosts in this world are many things. They are a vital economic resource. They are essential to public infrastructure. They are an intense field of academic study. They are not, however, mysterious, spooky, scary, magical or even remotely cool anymore. They have become as mundane as garbage trucks, air conditioners and aspirin. To be interested in ghosts now is akin to being really, really into stamp collecting. Ghosts are boring.
Which isn't to say it's all running smoothly forever.
It is estimated that 121 billion people have lived and died in the entire history of our species. Of those 121 billion people, scientists calculated that around 39 percent have become ghosts. If this is correct, that means there are about 47 billion ghosts in the world. This is, to be sure, a lot of ghosts. But it is also finite. The world realizes this only after ghosts became essential the world economy. By the time the problem of “peak ghost” is taken seriously, it is believed there are only about 14 billion ghosts left.
Technological advance does much to make ghosts more efficient, but this doesn't solve the problem. People seem to be meeting increased efficiency with increased consumption. Like, ghosts to power cars become very cheap, so people start driving more, thus canceling out the gain. This effect is found everywhere it's figured out how to do more with less. People just... Do even more than before.
World governments, plus a few corporations that may as well be governments, met to discuss the issue. The main problem was that the supply of ghosts wasn't really increasing. Sure, a few thousand people here and there would die and become ghosts, but those were just a drop in the bucket. They needed more, much more. They decide on a drastic solution.
By now the process behind which someone becomes a ghost is pretty well understood. They need either some sort of unfinished business or a particularly traumatic death. The problem is that, with ghosts raising the standard of living far beyond what had ever before been achieved, there are very few people who die in such circumstances. It is decided that this is what must change.
A new order is instituted. Before death, everyone must report to their local Spectral Conversion Center to be traumatically euthanized. Failure to do so results in steep fines for the loved ones who survive them. The program is considered a success: 89 percent of those processed become ghosts, which are then sold to businesses for any number of purposes. The only ones who avoid this fate are the very wealthy, who are allowed to pass on in peace to wherever it is they go when they die.
But for everyone else? The question of happens to you when you die has been now definitively answered. And the whole world suffers for it.
