and we are generally happy[2] taxing companies when their profitable activities impose nasty externalities on others
Maybe true, but the sort of externality that occurs when some jobs are paid less because of robots is a pecuniary externality, not a real externality—so the usual argument for taxing these activities doesn’t quite apply. Now, taxation of capital is actually somewhat justified (and robots are capital, obviously), but really only as an indirect taxation of especially valuable skill endowments (such as, hypothetically, the skill of repairing robots, or superintending a robot-reliant business) - and then only at rather mild levels that are already in play with the current income tax. (If income redistribution was not a factor, you’d rather tax consumption, labor income and resource rents + real externalities).
Maybe true, but the sort of externality that occurs when some jobs are paid less because of robots is a pecuniary externality, not a real externality—so the usual argument for taxing these activities doesn’t quite apply. Now, taxation of capital is actually somewhat justified (and robots are capital, obviously), but really only as an indirect taxation of especially valuable skill endowments (such as, hypothetically, the skill of repairing robots, or superintending a robot-reliant business) - and then only at rather mild levels that are already in play with the current income tax. (If income redistribution was not a factor, you’d rather tax consumption, labor income and resource rents + real externalities).