I think that before we are able to have a rational, human planned economy, it will be necessary to think a little longer about "higher standard of living" and what that means. What would really raise my standard of living is not having to work all my waking hours. I pretty much do now and I'm not even a workaholic: just straight 9/5.
I don't want stuff; I want my life back. Part of the capitalist/consumerist recipie is 1) take man out of nature 2) enable him to forget the extraordinary richness of nature 3) plonk him in front of a t.v. and TELL him every ten minutes that he needs some other frigging thing 4) convince him that the now impovrished environment he lives in can be improved by buying more crap 5) sell crap 6) when there's too much crap have a war 7) start over.
The man-made world looks terrific, but it's a subset not a superset. Remember that! I'm as grateful for dentists, anesthesia, and Mozart as the next person but these are not equivalent to capitalism.
Joanna B.