| The century from 1870 is filled with many one-time only developments that will never happen again: Things like accepting germ theory (so treating sewage and drinking water), the development of vaccines and antibiotics, the creation of mechanical motion (previously biological methods, in the horse, was the fastest mode), electricity (artificial light that did not entail burning things), mechanical/electrical calculation of numbers. These jumps in productivity/efficiency will never happen again, so expecting corresponding jumps in growth that they led to is not reasonable: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_American_... Certain new inventions and refinements of existing ones will continue, but it is hard to think of things that will improve people's lives as, say, clean drinking water. One things that could be done is more redistributive tax policies, like existed post-WW2, so as to better spread around the current income and wealth in a less concentrated way. |