Think The World Is Getting Worse?

(from YouTube)
In this clear-sighted book, Matt Ridley demonstrates that the world is getting better, and at an accelerating rate: food, income and lifespan are up; disease, child mortality and violence are down?all across the globe. Necessities and luxuries alike are getting cheaper; population growth is slowing down; Africa is following Asia out of poverty; the internet and the mobile phone are enriching people's lives as never before. The pessimists who dominate public discourse insist that we will soon reach a turning point and things will start to get worse. But they have been saying this for 200 years.


I also like what Penn Jillette says about things getting better: there's so much bad news everyday, but it's able to fit so well in a newspaper (the world isn't getting worse, we're just more aware of all the bad news).