Hasn't the luddite argument already been addressed by economists in general? Do we need to have it every time? Remember when a high percentage of humans worked in agricultural jobs?
In nearly every major economy, the people are better off today than they were 100 years ago, or 50 years ago. The US median may be the sole exception, due to having temporarily inherited the global manufacturing base all for itself after WW2.
Germany, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Austria, Czech, Slovakia, Ireland, Singapore, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Poland, Russia, Colombia, Mexico, Brazil - the people in these countries, in median economic terms, are better off today than at any other time in world history.
Even the French, whose economy has been stagnant for 20 years, are incredibly rich when it comes to median net wealth. In France it's $140,000 +/- median net wealth per adult, among the highest on earth.
The Japanese are in all sorts of trouble economically, and their people, in median terms, are far better off today than they were in 1920 or in 1970.
If you take a moment and look at maslow's hierarchy of needs you have to ask yourself do we really need all these jobs at the top of the pyramid? Why can't we all just make sure the entire world has the bottom part covered and then just relax and enjoy each other's company / enjoy nature / read a book? Sure, I get why we have roomba the robot, but come on.... Luxury Yachts for millions of dollars? Mansions? Super cars? I mean, wtf.
The Luddite argument is almost exactly as you've framed it, "technology eats my job, 'they' fix it so most people don't notice, we should collectively outlaw technology."
However, the Luddites, then and now, started from a fallacy that a 'job' was some sort of permanently defined thing, of which there was a finite supply. And sadly that is completely backwards. What there is, is capital, which is the output of an economy, which goes back into the economy to create more capital. Capital is not strictly 'money' which is a stand in for it at times, it is the potential to produce goods or services. That potential can be realized as $100 or it can be realized as someone who is not currently employed. The participants in the economy, people like you and me, make up new types of jobs all the time in order to convince some capital to flow your way. When we are successful we capture that capital, and then we reuse it to meet our own needs or goals. So when ever there is excess capital, there is job creation because everyone wants a piece of it.
you might not agree that military jobs are useful (I think they serve a useful purpose) or the government in general (could be smaller, but it's not all bullshit in my opinion )... but many people would disagree with you.
One of the examples is telemarketers.
It's not that the purpose behind these are bullshit, but the system is set up in an inefficient way rather than as a society doing things efficiently which would require less people. Many many jobs are manifestly bullshit (i.e. people expending effort and collecting salary doing something that could be done with much less effort a different way). Not only this, but even most non-bullshit jobs are comprised of a large percentage bullshit.
Technology has increased more than the standard of living and we are still working the same hours. Why? Because bullshit arises to claim the excess.
The median economic facts indicate greater income, wealth, life expectancy, standard of living, disposable income. Not to mention vastly superior / improved healthcare for the majority of countries versus 100 or 50 years ago.
EX1: The rediculus increase in the prison populaion from drugs and other BS crimes.
EX2: Todays minimum wage is equivelent to a 97 cent minimum wage in 1965 though the actual minimum wage in 1965 was 1.25$.
PS: Yes, some things cost less but education and housing more than make up the difference. And no education is not significantly better now.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite
Automating people out of work is not a new problem
The Australian government predicts a 10% growth in that industry in the next 5 years. http://lmip.gov.au/default.aspx?LMIP/EmploymentProjections
Australia's unemployment rate is 6% - so that's basically a doubling of workers looking for jobs, from computerisation of one industry.
Obviously 5 years is too short term for automation of transport, but projecting further than that is a fool's game.
The fear is that automation will affect more and more industries at the same time, leading to structural unemployment. That's where a person's worth is less than minimum wage relative to the price of automation - people simply can't be trained fast enough because the industries are changing too fast and computer power is cheap.
Automation means we can do less work but still enjoy the fruits of our labour as if we did more work. I certainly wouldn't oppose that.
The Luddites wanted to prevent automation but I don't, so you'll need to clarify if that's not what you meant.
People have to teach themselves all sorts of coping mechanisms to stop their minds going out of control with modern work (burnout being a vague example around here).