I suspect the harder problems you're thinking of are all technological. The current ones we are facing are social and political more than anything, so I don't share your optimism...
Humanity is huge and diverse - if a group of people decides to stop evolving and stagnate, another will gladly steal their place.
What you call "progress" is what led us here. Remains to be seen if "here" is a trap. You seem to think that everything is fine since everything will be fine, but that opinion doesn't have a consensus right now. I prefer to remain more doubtful.