The PM was asked by the BBC if he would consider changing the government's fiscal rules and responded: "No, because we had to stabilise the economy, which is what we did with the Budget." He added: "The difference is that the global situation has changed - I think most people would understand that in the last few weeks and months the international insecurity has got very real - that does impact domestically." The chancellor's rules, which she has argued will bring stability to the UK economy, are that day-to-day government costs will be paid for by tax income, rather than borrowing; and to get debt falling as a share of national income by the end of this parliament in 2029/30. Sir Keir said the government was "looking across the board" at spending, when asked by BBC 5 Live whether cuts would be announced for departments whose spending is not protected, such as the Ministry of Justice. "At the budget last year we made some record investments, and we're not going to undo that," he added, pointing to increased NHS spending.

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.

The World Bank has a reassuring message for those fearful of being made obsolete by automation. The robot age is nothing to be worried about. Just like all previous waves of technological advance, the fourth industrial revolution will create rather than destroy jobs, so fears of mass unemployment are largely unfounded. Nor should we be concerned that the arrival of the new machine age is going to widen the gap between rich and poor, because the idea that the world is becoming a less equal place is more perception than reality. Automation, according to the bank's World Development Report, is an opportunity not a threat.

Last week NAB kicked off its latest wave of job cuts billed as part of a restructure to "simplify" the bank. It's part of a three-year plan announced in 2017 to axe 6000 jobs while adding 2000 new technology roles. "As we simplify, we automate processes and things move to digital channels, we will need less people and as that happens we estimate that there will be 6000 less people needed in three years' time," NAB CEO Andrew Thorburn explained when announcing the cuts late last year. "Having said that, we're hiring 2000 people with different capabilities: data scientists, AI, robotics, automation, technology people, digital people, so the net [job loss] will be 4000 and that's just a reshaping that's going to happen." As machines learn how to perform tasks that would otherwise be done by humans, businesses will find themselves needing fewer staff to complete the same amount of work.

Although we are not yet on the cusp of a'post-human' society, the prospect of automation still poses significant challenges, including the potential shift of national income from labour to capital. Carys Roberts explains why public policy should seek to accelerate automation to reap the productivity benefits that come with it, but do so while building new institutions to ensure the dividends are broadly shared. 'Will a robot take our jobs?' has been a common question in the media. The threat of mass joblessness has even given rise to debates on the merits and drawbacks of a post-work society. But while debates have focussed on work, less attention has been paid to the other side of the coin: profit.

SINCE THE EARLY 1800s, several waves of technological change have transformed how we work and live. Each new technological marvel -- the steam engine, railroad, ocean steamship, telegraph, harvester, automobile, radio, airplane, TV, computer, satellite, mobile phone, and now the Internet -- has changed our home lives, communities, workplaces, schools, and leisure time. For two centuries we've asked whether ever-more-powerful machines would free us from drudgery or would instead enslave us. The question is becoming urgent. IBM's Deep Blue and other chess-playing computers now routinely beat the world's chess champions.

This is a story about the future. Not the unhappy future, the one where climate change turns the planet into a cinder or we all die in a global nuclear war. This is the happy version. It's the one where computers keep getting smarter and smarter, and clever engineers keep building better and better robots. Plus they're computers: They never get tired, they're never ill-tempered, they never make mistakes, and they have instant access to all of human knowledge. Global warming is a problem of the past because computers have figured out how to generate limitless amounts of green energy and intelligent robots have tirelessly built the infrastructure to deliver it to our homes. No one needs to work anymore. Robots can do everything humans can do, and they do it uncomplainingly, 24 hours a day. Some things remain scarce--beachfront property in Malibu, original Rembrandts--but thanks to super-efficient use of natural resources and massive recycling, scarcity of ordinary consumer goods is a thing of the past. Our days are spent however we please, perhaps in study, perhaps playing video games. Maybe you think I'm pulling your leg here.