Robots, artificial intelligence are hardly the end of work

Robots filling orders for Amazon AMZN, 0.99% and driverless vehicles hardly spell the end of work, but the artificial intelligence driving the current wave of automation -- if Americans don't embrace it effectively -- could catapult China ahead of the United States once and for all. Those of us who were around in the 1960s remember elevator operators and bowling alley pin-setters losing their jobs. Alarmists warn that artificial intelligence now is beginning to enable machines to replace not just unskilled workers but knowledge workers too -- for example, insurance adjusters. They worry society will divide between those owning the intellectual property and indolent masses who will depend on government handouts. More compelling is the example of mid-20th century office workers.