> Virtually everybody who ever lost a job to technology ended up better off for it.

That's plain wrong, and quite obviously so. You're demonstrating here a very common misunderstanding of the arguments people affected by (or worried about) automation taking their jobs make. In a very concise form:

- It's true that society and humanity so far always benefited from eliminating jobs through technology, in the long term.

- It's not true that society and humanity benefited in the immediate term, due to the economic and social disruption. And, most importantly:

- It's not true that people who lost jobs to technology were better off for it - those people, those specific individuals, as well as their families and local communities, were all screwed over by progress, having their lives permanently disrupted, and in many cases being thrown into poverty for generations.

(Hint: yes, there may be new jobs to replace old ones, but those jobs are there for the next generation of people, not for those who just lost theirs.)

Understanding that distinction - society vs. individual victims - will help make sense of e.g. why Luddites destroyed the new mechanized looms and weaving frames. It was not about technology, it was about capital owners pulling the rug from under them, and leaving them and their children to starve.

> Virtually everybody who ever lost a job to technology ended up better off for it.

this feels like a much stronger claim than is typically made about the benefits of technological progress

Certainly no stronger than the claim I was responding to. They are essentially pining for the return of careers that haven't existed for a century.