We’re still better off than ever before

Steven Pinker wrote at the Free Press:

Human progress continues, with some backsliding.

Since publishing two books on human progress (The Better Angels of Our Nature, 2011, and Enlightenment Now, 2018), every year I update my graphs on the major dimensions of human well-being. Most people think everything’s gotten worse, but that can be a misleading impression from following headlines, a nonrandom sample of the worst things happening anywhere on earth. The data show that, after the pandemic blip, global life expectancy, affluence, and literacy are at all-time highs, while extreme poverty and violent crime are at all-time lows. The world has backslid in democracy and war deaths, taking us back to levels in the late 1990s—though we’re still better than at any time in the 20th century since relevant data were recorded.

Worth remembering how much things have improved (especially for those in the third world) in recent decades.

The post We’re still better off than ever before first appeared on Kiwiblog.