Just to keep up with population growth the economy needs to grow so there will be enough jobs, goods, and services per capita. If per capita wealth is to increa

Just to keep up with population growth the economy needs to grow so there will be enough jobs, goods, and services per capita. If per capita wealth is to increase, not only do there need to be more workers but also more output per person. It's very hard for an economy to be steady state. You're either growing or dying. Productivity growth is efficiency. 3% of people work in agriculture when before 100% of people were subsidence farmers. The entire modern economy is possible due to productivity gains in food production.