Delivering presents to every child around the world in a single evening is an exhausting task, with only one man fit for the job - Father Christmas. But his outdated techniques seem more antiquated now than ever before. MailOnline spoke to a forward-thinking industry expert who offered Father Christmas some helpful advice to make his arduous task more efficient. Dr Carl Diver, academic lead at Manchester Metropolitan University in industry 4.0, said a hydrogen-powered sleigh, AI algorithms and elf-assisting robots could help. As well as streamlining production and making the manufacturing and delivery process more efficient, Dr Diver thinks the old methods would benefit from a sprucing up to make things easier, more cost-effective and better for the environment.

Robots are taking wages from American workers. A new study from the Federal Reserve Bank has found that the portion of national income give to human employees has dramatically decreased as automation continues to increase. The study suggests that employees that employees feel they have lost their bargaining power when it comes to asking for a raise out of fear they may be replaced by a robot. A new study from the Federal Reserve Bank has found that the portion of national income has dramatically decreased as automation continues to increase. 'Businesses have more options to automate hard-to-fill positions now than in the past,' the study authors write.

Billionaire Jack Ma said Thursday envisions a bright new future for the chronically overworked: a 12-hour work week. According to Ma, a Chinese business magnate who helms mega-retailer, Alibaba, meteoric advances in artificial intelligence and reforms in education could mean many workers will eventually work only a quarter of their current weekly hours. Theoretically, that would mean working as little as three days per week for four hours each day, he said inconversation with Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, at an AI conference in China. Alibaba chief, Jack Ma (pictured above) thinks that with the proper advances in AI and the education system that workers could soon enjoy a 12-hour work week. 'For the next 10, 20 years, every human being, country, government should focus on reforming the education system, making sure our kids can find a job, a job that only requires three days a week, four hours a day,' Ma said at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai Thursday according to Bloomberg.

Losing a job is never easy on the mind, but according to a recent study, the psychological severity may depend on exactly who -- or what -- is doing the usurping. According to researchers at the Technical University of Munich in Germany, most people would prefer to lose their own jobs to a robot as opposed to a human. In a study, researchers asked 300 people their preferences on losing professional roles -- both their own or a co-workers -- to either robots or humans. A new study says that workers would rather have their jobs replace by robots over humans to lessen the psychological blow. What they found was that when it comes to somebody else's job, most of them said they would prefer a human to step in -- an overwhelming 62 percent.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is showing that tech companies are finally getting a grasp on robotic appendages. In a demonstration at the re:MARS conference in Las Vegas -- a Bezos sponsored event to showcase the latest advancements in machine learning, automation, robotics and space -- the CEO showed off a duo of surprisingly agile robotic hands. In a video on Twitter, Bezos can be seen using high-tech gloves to manipulate a pair of robotic arms. By mimicking his motions, Bezos is able to summon the arms to carry out sophisticated actions using fine motor skills. In one exercise, Bezos is seen passing a ball back and forth between hands and in another he uses the arms to adeptly place plastic rings around a rung.

While many fear the possibility of robots taking their job, a growing number of companies are putting AI-equipped machines to work in roles humans never wanted in the first place. This includes a broad range of applications, from tracking parasite bugs that pose a critical threat to forests to learning to identify risk in legal documents, according to Bloomberg. Swedish packaging company BillerudKorsnas has put robots in place in roles that involve repetitive tasks. Specifically, it's using AI systems to monitor massive amounts of data, in order to determine how long to cook wood chips before they turn into pulp. This would be an otherwise tedious tasks for humans, since they'd be charged with staring at diagrams all day.

A self-driving robot is being trialled in a Ford manufacturing plant in Spain that can overcome obstructions and carry cargo. The robot, similar in appearance to the Wall-E trash-crushing robot from Pixar, has been nicknamed'Survival' and was developed by Ford's own engineers. It uses Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology to visualise its surroundings and guides itself autonomously. Survival's body includes an automated shelf with 17 drawers of different sizes that holds various materials and tools. A self-driving robot'Survival' (pictured) is being trialled in a Ford manufacturing plant in Spain to overcome obstructions and move cargo around Its makers say that the robot is designed to work alongside human employees and not replace them.

Use of robots in construction will rapidly expand in the coming years with increasing speed, efficiency, safety, and profits, a new report claims. The industry is'ripe for disruption' after relying on manual labour for so long, according to AI consulting firm Tractica. It cited the recent adoption of robotic technology by a number of companies as the beginning of a growth curve. Projections place the value of the construction robotics industry in the region of $226 million (£173m) by 2025, a 10 fold increase compared to 2018. Wile the majority of demand is likely to come from construction sites such as demolition, a number of more specialised functions such as 3D printing, also face mass automation.

Robots are increasingly picking up the slack in package distribution centers. Honeywell and Siemens have unveiled new machines that are capable of autonomously ferrying packages from the tractor trailer to the fulfillment center with surprising accuracy, according to Bloomberg. It comes as consumers increasingly expect two-day or even same-day delivery, causing shipping companies to embrace automation as a solution to meet the spike in demand. Both Honeywell and Siemens' robot unloaders drive up to the back of a tractor trailer and use machine learning to identify packages. And, the companies say their machines work just as fast, if not faster, than human employees.

U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to sign an executive order on Monday announcing the'American AI Initiative.' The order will ask federal government agencies to dedicate more resources and investment into research, promotion and training on artificial intelligence (AI), a senior administration official said. Under the American AI Initiative, the administration will direct agencies to prioritize AI investments in research and development, increase access to federal data and models for that research and prepare workers to adapt to the era of AI. Trump's'American AI Initiative' will ask federal government agencies to dedicate more resources and investment into research, promotion and training on artificial intelligence The World Economic Forum has unveiled its latest predictions for the future of jobs. Its 2018 report surveyed executives representing 15 million employees in 20 economies.