Who gives a damn about what is good for business? Businesses are (very) important only up to a certain point, until their interests start to go against the interests of the people.
If you are too nice and polite, you show a weakness. Dealing with someone who has unlimited power in a limited area is difficult business; I usually act as a polite but a dangerous asshole.
> It's like saying "my neurons aren't conscious therefore I am not conscious", which is clearly not the case.
You need to read Searle's works again; his point is actually the opposite - we are machines made out of biological neurons, which seem to have an externally unobservable property of being conscious; we do not know what it is caused by, but we can see today that it is possible to create a simulation of human behavior by means of logical gates. We have no idea if it will have mind or not.
> We're made of matter, computers are made of matter, where is the difference?
That's an odd argument. And actually does not contradict Searle at all.
Consciousness does not have external signs; I have not a slightest idea what it means "act like you're conscious"; a paralyzed person is conscious after all. The only reason to believe that humans (aside of myself, obviously) are conscious is that all humans share structural similarity with me.
Your view on singularity largely depends on your relationships with John Searle Chinese room argument; I accept it, and do not find Kurzweil views convincing.
If you want affordable, build dense, urban cities; not NY style rows after rows of 2 story building, separated by roads, but USSR style large 4-6-9 story blocks, build from concrete (longevity, privacy) with no eventually moldy drywalls, closed for through traffic, with parking garages, public places, playgrounds etc. American university campuses can be good models for residential neighborhoods.