[fallingknife]

Only a small minority of farm workers owned the farms they worked on even back before tractors. And the tractors didn't do much to help most of those owners either. Industrial farm equipment increased the area a single farmer can work so far beyond what he could before that it made no sense for owners of the time to each have their own equipment and most sold their land and consolidated the industry into much larger farms. Farm employment went from 90% of all workers before the industrial revolution down to a bit over 1% today in the US.

And maybe it happens to software engineers next. So what? The economy looks completely different today than it did 50 years ago, which was completely different than 50 years before that, and that shouldn't stop just because some people feel childishly entitled to do the same work for their whole lives even it if it is obsolete. I'll just change careers like I have done twice before. There's a massive shortage of electrical/plumbing/hvac contractors. There's a massive shortage of nurses / doctors that will only get worse as the population gets older. Not as cushy as my mid six figure tech job, but I have no god given right to that. And there's plenty more opportunity beyond that for anyone willing to take it, so if any other engineers want to cry about it, their tears will be wasted on me.

[Aurornis]

As someone descended from farmers on both sides (and half of my wife’s family too), I’m always amazed to see people glorifying the history of farming.

Like you said, owning farmland wasn’t as common as everyone assumes. The number of farming analogies where everyone imagines the farmer as operating a lucrative business empire on land they own is a testament to how much people manufacture historical narratives to fit their desired narratives.