We can make any and everyone richer, almost. It is a matter of desire and will.
It is correct "Short-sighted solutions of money-giving rarely improve our lives" but if you educate or train them and then make sure they have heathy food and get treatments for disease and defect they will be richer. Not just or necessarily financially richer but they will have richer lives.
This would lead to a richer society. This is the biggest difference between advanced/developed societies and less advanced/underdeveloped societies.
The topic of economics in a vacuum is usually just abstract theory. What must be studied is socio-economics. Economics theory relies on the rational human concept. Humans are often irrational so economics without the irrational human factors leads to flawed policy. It often creates perverse incentives.
You have taken a baby step in the correct direction but your author has fed you oversimplifications. Only a primer, time to really go to school. I am sure you learn a lot in school but we can't stay in school all our lives, we need to learn to live and learn at the same time.
More money is often more wealth.
You can get something for (almost) nothing.
Some technology does take jobs (more jobs than it creates).
The devil is in the details.
The government could print money without creating inflation if it spends it on the right things. If the government spends money on infrastructure technology and education that results in great enough increases in productivity it could actually create deflation.
Deflation lowers the cost for a standard of living but erodes the value of assets.
Imagine a breakthrough that cuts the cost of energy and housing in half or seed that produces twice the crops with no more land, water or fertilizer. Now those ideas are crazy just to make a point. More real would be smaller changes that accrue over time until the halving and doubling is achieved.
This is how our current developed world standard of living was achieved. Huge investments (spending trillions of dollars) in education, infrastructure and technology by both the government and industry.
There was a time Europe and America when unskilled labor barely earned a spot in a dirt floored shack and meat maybe once a week. There are places on the planet where this is still the case because nobody made the investment in education, infrastructure and technology.
