It seems likely that autonomous laborers, assembly-line workers, clerks and low-level managers would, without requiring such flirtation, be useful and sufficient for the society of abundance that is our main objective.

In an intelligent society that was highly integrated and capable of consensus-building, something like that may be possible. This is not our society. Research into stronger AI would remain a significant opportunity to get an advantage in {economic, military, ideological} competition. Unless you can find some way to implement a global coordination framework to prevent this kind of escalation, fast research of that kind is likely to continue.