We know the opposite is actually true. When comparing hunter/gatherer skeletons with the earliest farmers, agriculture was not an advance in health. Farmers died younger, and were shorter and less healthy. The big mystery is why, and why we kept doing it if it was not an improvement.
Aw, nuts! Thank you, Vince Ferrer! I didn't know that.
Why did we continue to pursue agriculture? Hmmm! I wonder whether it could have had something to do with slavery. That's just a wild guess, but...
More children live with agriculture. More children live means larger populations.
Jared Diamond’s “Guns Germs and Steel” recounted a case where an agricultural people conquered a hunter-gatherer people, but the island wasn’t suited to agriculture, so they converted to hunter-gatherers.