Forget rockets, a self-driving car is exactly the technology you would want for autonomous moon mining.

Why would autonomy be important for moon mining, with a round trip time of 2.5 seconds? The cost of an operator couldn't possibly be significant relative to the other costs involved in moon mining.

Airplanes have auto pilot, construction equipment has GPS guidance, warehouses have automated material handling/sorting, and stores have self-checkout. Automation happens, even if people are "cheap".