It kind of was though? It was knowledge work that brought us fertilizers, tractors, trucks and large ships, which in turn made food as abundant as it is today.

Otherwise most of us would still toil on the fields just to harvest a tiny bit more food than our immediate family needs.

Still not the bottleneck.

> It was knowledge work that brought us fertilizers, tractors, trucks and large ships, which

Yes but the number of people who actually worked on the R&D and the amount of time they spent on it is absolutely insignificant on the grand scale of things.