The vast majority of the population used to work in manual agricultural work, until it was largely automated to the point we're down to <1% in agri employment.

The vast majority of the population used to work in manual agricultural work, until it was largely automated to the point we're down to <1% in agri employment. The result of this huge wave of automation was not profit for agricultural companies and farms. The average operating margin for farms is 11%. What else happened? The resulting plummeting food prices lifted billions out of poverty, to the point where extreme poverty is at the lowest level ever. It's a little bit hard to see backroom fat cats with cigars behind this movement when automation has only ever brought massive benefits to society, including when 90% of the population worked in a vulnerable industry. Your mistake is believing that humans have a fixed set of jobs and when jobs are removed from the job pool that the pool shrinks. In reality, the size of the pool is increasing while some jobs within the pool reduce in size and scope. From my perspective, it's also hard to see how automating back-breaking laborious jobs like cleaning, burger flipping or fruit picking is a bad thing. These jobs ruin your body. Ever see a manual laborer who was over 50 and didn't have at least one body ailment?