That's a really scary thought that isn't far fetched. This might be the easiest way to make revenue for a country/state/city if you can produce them and tax them right away. You don't need to wait for children born in the area to reach a tax paying age or put efforts into trying to attract citizens from away.

If this were the case, wouldn't it be possible to have an entire province populated by robots? That might be better for people though for harsh regions where the value comes from mining, for example.

A government could build robots who mine the resources, tax the robots on that resource, and reinvest the remaining into mining the resources. No people would be harmed as a result of mining the resources and the work would be much more efficient (ideally).