Comment by dkural
There is two contributors to growth: increase in population, and productivity gains. If tech adoption slows down and population slows down, we go back to the historical norm of no economic growth.
There is two contributors to growth: increase in population, and productivity gains. If tech adoption slows down and population slows down, we go back to the historical norm of no economic growth.
If you view the humans actually producing stuff as human capital, which many economists have done, then keeping that (human) capital in decent enough form by allowing it to have access to decent enough healthcare is a logical step forward.
We could then go a step or two forward and posit that a sick populace means a sick consumer class means reduced demand for goods that generate growth, but those are just details.
A somewhat unfair characterization of the historical norm. Before the Italian Renaissance, history was marked by periods of growth interleaved with periods of decline, in many cases because a societal crisis caused a destructive regime to take hold. For example, the Mongol conquests installed an extractive regime that was soon replaced by the ultraconservative Ming dynasty, which resulted in China's progress stalling for some four centuries.
Productivity gains don't only come from technological progress. Accumulation of capital, such as infrastructure, education, access to healthcare etc, also increase productivity.