In the airy lobby of Taipei's new technology hub, customers are waiting on their boba fix at Crane Cha, a beverage store. Behind a plexiglass partition, a robot is assembling their drinks. The Bubble Tea Shaker Robot, or BTSR, launched in 2018 and is the brainchild of Taiwan Intelligent Robotics Co. After the machine receives a customer's order, its thick white robotic arm moves along a wall of nozzles to fill up on ingredients--tea, milk, ice, sugar, toppings--in its stainless steel shaker. The BTSR shakes it to mix and pours the contents into a paper cup, which is sealed and handed to the customer.

The Amazon logo appears on the company's logistics center in Brieselang, Germany, west of Berlin. Amazon announced Thursday it plans to add 30,000 part-time positions in the U.S. over the next year, part of a massive hiring binge by the online retailing giant. The part-time hiring includes 5,000 jobs in Virtual Customer Service, which would allow employees to work as a customer service agent from home. The remaining 25,000 would be at Amazon warehouses. Any part-time employees who work 20 hours or more a week are also eligible for benefits.

On Friday the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released its November jobs report, announcing that the unemployment rate had dropped to 4.6%, the lowest it's been since August 2007. According to this measure, the U.S. economy is at or very close to full employment. The White House touted the news, highlighting that U.S. businesses created 178,000 jobs in November and 15.6 million since early 2010. To some, the economy is returning to its pre-recession strength. To others, the unemployment rate is a poor gauge of economic health.