Why are companies rushing to replace human workers with robots based on machine learning? Because that is a way to make the rich richer, and the poor poorer as a byproduct.

Additional robots are greatly reducing the number of jobs in manufacturing, and are likely to continue doing so.

The fact that one particular factory in the UK has more staff now than in 2007 is neither here nor there. Evidently a bigger fraction of the country's manufacturing has been concentrated there.

The increase in productivity is a benefit to whoever owns the factory, and the small fraction of people employed there. But it is not good for society overall unless those benefits are shared with society overall.

It is a mistake to see the issue in nationalistic terms as a competition with other countries. It does no good to country C to have robot factories there rather than in D, E and F, if the benefits go in each case only to the few owners. What matters to country C is making sure the people there who don't own plenty of stock in robot factories can nonetheless enjoy the products of these factories, and everything else one needs for a good life.