If you start your new return in exactly the same account with the same user ID that you used for 2018 and you choose to transfer your 2018 data in to the 2019 return before you enter any other data yourself, it would do just what you are complaining it did not do.  It sounds like you did not transfer 2018 to 2019.

How to transfer last year’s return? https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900883

Many people have multiple TT accounts and forget how to access them.  Log out of the account you are in now.

Account recovery

https://myturbotax.intuit.com/account-recovery/

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1901535-forgot-your-turbotax-online-user-id-or-password

Or did you use the desktop version of TurboTax?  If so, the files are on your own hard drive or any backup device you used like a flash drive.

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1901486-how-many-turbotax-accounts-do-i-have

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1901535

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1901659-find-your-tax-data-file-in-mac

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900721-find-your-tax-data-file-tax-file-in-windows

To get a copy of your previously filed returns prepared with online TurboTax https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900748-how-do-i-get-a-copy-of-a-return-i-filed-in-turbotax-online

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900748-how-do-i-get-a-copy-of-a-return-i-filed-this-year-in-turbo...

It's not a complaint. It's a question and a calling out of poor automation.

Insofar as transferring one year to another, I did. So that would automatically transfer the EIN along with employer info, which I believe was the thrust of your answer. I had mistaken the EIN for something else.

What the transfer has not done is included the employer's download code (entered last year) that enables easy population of W-2 info. This is very useful when the employer hasn't generated a hard copy version from which to enter manually.

Thanks for taking the time to include those links comprehensive links and making distinctions about which ones would apply to which scenarios.