When I think of elevator operators, I think of health care. Now, it's not likely that many people think about elevator operators very often, if ever. Many have probably never seen a elevator operator. The idea of a uniformed person standing all day in a elevator pushing buttons so that people can get to their floors seems unnecessary at best and ludicrous at worse. But once upon a time they were essential, until they weren't.

This op-ed originally appeared in Real Clear Markets on October 30, 2019. Robots have been coming for and successfully eliminating jobs for a long time: ask the iceman, elevator operator, or travel agent (if you can still find one). But what happens when the robots come for your job, succeed, and your job remains? Sounds strange but consider the conflicting reality of bank tellers and the robot designed to replace them: the Automated Teller Machine (ATM). The first ATM appeared in America in 1969.

They further say, as a result, we need to rely on the government to support the population via universal basic income or UBI. Even Bill Gates who has transformed the world through tech innovation argued we should tax robots to slow innovation and use the money to hire people. Virtually all the other top tech billionaires and Warren Buffet seem to agree. But as we mentioned above, the experts seem to be very wrong about so many major predictions. It is actually very difficult to think of predictions that they got right.

Self-driving cars have gotten so advanced in recent years that many proponents believe humans should be banned from driving altogether. But the boss of Google's Waymo, which is widely considered to be the leader in autonomous vehicle testing, doesn't agree. At a media event in New York City, Waymo CEO John Krafcik was asked whether he believed the rise of self-driving cars would eventually remove the need for human drivers. 'Good heavens, no,' Krafcik told Jalopnik. John Krafcik, the CEO of Waymo, stands with the Jaguar I-Pace vehicle on Tuesday.

The small, blue shuttle drove defensively. Piloted entirely by computer, it followed the rules of the road like a student driver trying to impress an instructor. It approached the traffic signal, where it was set to turn right. On the corner, a pedestrian attempted to wave it on through before realizing there was no driver to heed his directive. The stalemate -- politeness verses programming -- only was broken when the light turned green and the shuttle could lawfully proceed.

Digitization and the next wave of automation will change the nature of work, eliminating some traditional jobs and impacting many more. But it will also create growth and new employment opportunities, and if we manage the transition, everyone could benefit. Political promises to "bring back" well paid jobs in manufacturing and others sectors are a cruel deception that ignore the realities of a global inter-connected economy. Instead, we should focus on the challenges and opportunities presented by new technology trends, including artificial intelligence, machine learning, and Big Data analytics. The concerns some employees and young people have about the impact of next-generation automation on jobs and pay are understandable.

In a room at the United Nations overlooking New York's East River, at a table as long as a tennis court, around 70 of the best minds in artificial intelligence recently ate a sea bass dinner and could not, for the life of them, agree on the coming impact of AI and robots. This is perhaps the most vexing challenge of AI. There's a great deal of agreement around the notion that humans are creating a genie unlike any that's poofed out of a bottle so far--yet no consensus on what that genie will ultimately do for us. Will AI robots gobble all our jobs and render us their pets? Tesla CEO Elon Musk, perhaps the most admired entrepreneur of the decade, thinks so.