[...] This translates directly into higher labor productivity and--eventually, and if workers acquire the necessary skills, and society develops the necessary tools for managing income distribution--higher wages. Mechanization or robotization is not new and unusual, no matter how clever and impressive the robots are. They are just the latest generation of capital investment, and it benefits workers to have more capital enhancing what they can do. Eventually, productive investment drives long-run economic growth and the higher incomes that come with that; how the incomes are shared is a social and political challenge. It is, in the long run, a good thing that machines or robots take over activities they can do, freeing humans for the things only they can do. This makes work much more intrinsically rewarding for very many people.

I don't think, however, that we understand how to think about what increasing productivity means, or how its benefits will be shared, when there is no "product." Increased income inequality has accompanied the productivity increases linked to digital technologies, indicating that the gains have not been all that widely shared so far. This accounts for the confusing debate under way among economists about the implications for jobs and incomes, including income distribution, of the current wave of capital investment in digital equipment and machines.