Embracing Progress | Marian L. Tupy | Cato Institute: Commentary

Embracing Progress | Marian L. Tupy | Cato Institute: Commentary: "In the 1970s, hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate.” Thus began The Population Bomb"

"Since those now infamous words were written, world population has doubled from 3.5 billion to 7 billion, inflation-adjusted average annual income per person has risen from $3,147 to $5,997, and life expectancy at birth has increased from 59 years to 69 years."

"In sub-Saharan Africa, the caloric intake increased from 2,290 to 2,420 in just 16 years."

"[Africa]’s population has more than trebled — from 280 million to 854 million — since 1968, and life expectancy has increased from 44 years to 54 years."

"In 1981, 70 percent of people in poor countries lived on less than $2 a day, while 42 percent survived on less than $1 a day. Today, 43 percent live on less than $2 a day, while 14 percent survive on less than $1. “Poverty reduction of this magnitude is unparalleled in history,”"

"“Violence has been in decline for thousands of years, and today we may be living in the most peaceable era in the existence of our species.” Indeed, studies have shown that hunter-gatherer societies experienced about 524 violent deaths per 100,000. The rate of violent deaths in the war-torn 20th century, by comparison, amounted to a mere 60 per 100,000."

"Why are we as a species so willing to believe in doomsday scenarios that never quite materialize?"