How much did twenty years of development actually change our lives?
The usual method is to assemble several perspectives, assign weights to them and compare the results. I find that approach too conventional for this question. Try a small act of time travel instead.
Imagine that you have returned to 2004. You may observe, but you cannot interfere. Watch one ordinary day in your old life, quietly and from beginning to end. Start with the private details, then move outward to the world around you. Only after you have watched that whole day should you ask again: did development make life better?