Realistically climate catastrophe seems worse to me yes than living as a peasant or ancient Egyptian. Our choices aren’t so limited however. But if you mean we should look at our standard of living today and appreciate them, let’s examine that with some nuance.
Since 1980 pay and productivity have been decoupled in the global north such that the wealthy have continued to grow richer while the median worker hasn’t seen their real wages rise, despite being more productive. In fact much of our rise in standard of living prior to 1980 is not due to the allowing concentrated wealth to run rampant but people fighting the wealthy for things like worker rights, democratic rights, social programs.
If we look at the global south on the other hand since 1980 we see a great rise out of poverty. This has happened primarily due to China’s socialist policies which have pulled 800 million people out of poverty.
Allowing a small wealthy minority to run one’s country is undemocratic as they are able to use their outsized money and power to control the government and further grow their own wealth. It’s precisely why we face problems like authoritarianism, climate change, and austerity - toxic transitions all funded by monied interests.
Does the world really seem like it’s continuing to progress to you? Is our choice really so limited as either ‘hand over the reigns of society to billionaires’ or ‘revert to medieval peasantry’? Consider the improvements in the quality of life we’ve seen in the past century. People came together and fought for those improvements. They didn’t trust and depend on their monied masters to drop crumbs their way. That never happens. They fought for better lives and achieved them.