[expat_panama]

...it didn’t disappear because of “robots.”

There are two things we might want to understand here.  One is that the article doesn't blame "robots" for "stolen factory jobs. Folks with graduate degrees in robotics laboring in Palo Alto, Calif., West Lafayette, Ind. and Boston are to blame."

The other thing is that we need to understand what folks w/ degrees in robotics build.  

 

←they don't build stuff like this...

 

...they design these things: ↓

WENDY’S ANNOUNCEMENT that it will deploy self-service kiosks across its 6,000-plus restaurants like the one abovebytheendof the year should benosurprise to thosewhounderstand theimpact ofminimum-wagehikesonjobs. As the government makes employing unskilled workers more expensive, robots and other job-killing machines become more economically feasible. A bill to raise the minimum wage to $15 should be called the Robot Full Employment Act.

[Ozark Tom]

If automation really-really pushed down the costs of manufacture, then more product would be in reach of the consumer. More of everything for the same cost input. To foster economic growth locally, the manufacturing profits would have to invested locally to maintain the consumer base.