The primordial state of man is poverty. Nature is unforgiving in its scarcity of available means. On a fixed amount of land with a fixed amount of technology, there is a physical limit to the output of labor. As Hans-Hermann Hoppe observes:

Only one way exists for such a stationary society to further increase real income per head or to grow in size without a loss in per capita income: through technological innovation, i.e., by the employment of better, more efficient tools made possible through savings brought about by the abstention from leisure or other immediate consumption.