Even if we don't feel materially richer, we take for granted how steady quality-of-life improvements have continued to progress. People just don't want to do th

Even if we don't feel materially richer, we take for granted how steady quality-of-life improvements have continued to progress. People just don't want to do the kind of work we did 40 years ago. This is why "worker productivity" is one of the most important measures of innovation. If we've been sending out the same number of dudes to chip and paint for the last 100 years, that's a good sign that technology is lagging or has been underinvested in.