Or we could stop building throwaway things. Sure it won't reduce mining to zero, but when a significant fraction of what we mine is ending up in landfills after just a few years, there sure is margin of improvement.
We have massive numbers of people who are still really poor. Making quality infrastructure and products for these people involves lots of brand-new metals.
In the meantime, increasing quality and recycling is merely a multiplier increasing the efficiency of our system. You can't recycle your way to economic greatness.
