History has been nothing but tribal wars, slavery, & grinding poverty for the overwhelming majority of history. Telecommunications & industrialization brought about the end of slavery & produced the greastest prosperity ever known. You can't whip a slave into doing skilled labor. The more skill & understanding is needed to produce things the more people have to learn to trade with one another if they want to be propersous.

Even fiat money, with all of its flaws, became dominant because the benefit of facilitating global trade was far more valuable to everyone involved than the costs.