Bangladesh, Oct. 15 -- The worlds most influential technology leaders, including Elon Musk, have floated a future in which artificial intelligence and advanced robotics make traditional employment optional and money far less important. Their vision is bold: superintelligent machines could produce so much wealth and abundance that humanity might finally escape the centuries-old struggle to earn enough to survive.

But there is a fundamental flaw in assuming that technological abundance will automatically make money irrelevant. Machines may transform the global economy, eliminate millions of jobs and dramatically reduce the cost of living. They cannot, however, guarantee that human beings will abandon greed, competition or the desire for po...