Spoiled

We're only 249 years old officially, but the USA definitely became that game-changer that monarchs of the world feared we would be. Many people were inspired to believe in liberty and self-governance after this dangerous idea spread and went "viral" (by the standards of that day).

Beyond political effects, though, the USA became hugely wealthy by global standards, wealthy beyond what the founders probably pictured. In fact, it may be said that Americans became "spoiled" by our success.

Immigrants think so, according to this black American:

"Black immigrants don't really respect . . people who are traditionally born in America. [Their experience was] to relentlessly eat, sleep, grind, hustle, go and get it, so when they finally get over into America and they see the opportunities that are presented [here], Nigerians, Jamaicans, any kind of immigrant come over here in this country [they] mop the floor with . . specifically black Americans . ."

Here's one of those immigrants, who disdains the "protests": Fayz 

Boeing problems

Aerospace company Boeing is the largest in that sector, with a workforce of over 170,000. Their new CEO as of August has multiple problems to solve, including a huge backlog of of $500 billion. A two-month strike by machinists just ended this month.

Quality and safety failures have damaged its hundred-year reputation. Their spacecraft Starliner carried astronauts to the ISS for the first time last June, but NASA judged it unsafe to return those astronauts, so it came back to Earth empty.

Last January a panel broke away from a Boeing airplane at 16,000 feet shortly after the Alaska Airlines commercial flight took off. No one was seriously hurt, though the plane (photo) also lost a cushion from the seat immediately next to the blown-out section of fuselage😮

(cont'd tomorrow)

Better news 3

Over the last hundred years, living conditions in the U.S. have changed dramatically. Compare how you and your friends live today . . with the standard of living about a century ago.

1915 vs 2015

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has a report on the amazingly more prosperous life of an average American worker in 2015 compared to that of an American worker one hundred years earlier, 1915.

How can a comparison be made between different eras? Not by money so much, but by a comparison of what that worker could afford to have in his home.

An article in the 1913 Journal of Home Economics describes an average apartment home in New York City:

". .  a four room flat, rent nineteen dollars, nine in family. . This family of nine has a boarder to help pay the rent. . . There is a bath tub, but the clothes wringer and last winter’s sleds are always kept in it. This is not the home of a very poor family: the father earns twelve dollars a week, two girls are in a factory . ."

(from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics)

workers paint the Brooklyn Bridge 1915

Better news 2

Progress within your own lifetime:

Progress

Your country - and your world - has changed since you were born.

Go to yourlifeinnumbers.org, enter your country and the year you were born to find out how much it has changed in your own lifetime. You'll see differences in food supply per person, how much schooling the average person had, average income, and more.

There's been a lot of improvement in most countries. Check out your parents' birth years to see how much improvement there's been since they were born.

Better news 1

Anxiety seems more common than ever, and bad news does seem to attract readers. But not all the news is bad. This week, we start with three inspiring stories from a few years ago.

Longevity

There are more people in the world than ever. At the same time, the average level of both health and prosperity have increased:

"Despite what we hear on the news and from many authorities, the great story of our era is that we are witnessing the greatest improvement in global living standards ever to take place. Poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy, child labor and infant mortality are falling faster than at any other time in human history. . . A child born today is more likely to reach retirement age than his forbears were to live to their fifth birthday."

The chart below shows how much child mortality, hunger, illiteracy, pollution and poverty declined globally - just from the 1990 level to that of 2015.

from Human Progress

Food insecurity

Global poverty and famine have declined greatly over the past few decades. A bigger portion of the people of the world are fed and educated than ever before. It's been reported many times in recent years, though many still don't know about it.

But that progress has stalled because of pandemic consequences and the Ukraine war. Now the United Nations is talking about a "food crisis." In an official message last October, they said that "A staggering three billion people cannot afford a healthy diet; the war in Ukraine has triggered surging food, fertilizer, and energy prices . . ."

Very inflated prices of food are already here, and there will be more. We in the West can manage the inflation and mostly sustain our diet. But countries with less robust economies will struggle. There won't be as much wheat or sunflower oil going to those countries as foreign aid because Ukraine produces a big part of the world's supply - and you know that Ukraine is hugely disrupted now.

image

You could say that The Netherlands, also a big exporter of food, picked a bad time to forcibly cut food production. They're going to shut down farms, restrict meat production, and make life more difficult for their farm families.

World prosperity 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

In the "age of globalization" mentioned yesterday (starting ~1980), more free & open  markets are available. People dream of starting their own business and making it a success, but they are held back if they live in a command-type society where no person-owned business is allowed by government. Freer economies provide many more opportunities.

When more people are free to dream about prospering, their society has more prosperity. 

Cambodia's story is a great example. Check out the series from last fall:

Cambodia 1
Cambodia 2
Cambodia 3
Cambodia 4

Mr. Lim (owner of a tourism business) says in "Cambodia 4" that his country prospered because of freedom, technology, and the "entrepreneurial spirit of the Cambodian people."

map

World prosperity 1

Last Friday's post included World Bank's chart of growing prosperity in the world's poorest countries. Global poverty has been shrinking for decades while the good metrics (education, nutrition, etc.) climb higher. 

Some might ask: is this just World Bank's self-serving interpretation? No, the global trend is widely reported. Just as an example, the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) is definitely on the other side of the political spectrum, but it reports the same global trend.

In 1992 the world's population was about 5.5 billion. Twenty-five years later it was about 7.5 billion. In spite of adding two billion additional people to the world, the number of extremely poor fell. How did that happen?

"The Industrial Revolution turned the once-impoverished western countries into abundant societies. The new age of globalization, which started around 1980, saw the developing world enter the global economy and resulted in the largest escape from poverty ever recorded."

Asean business networking

(cont'd tomorrow)

2020 vision 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

It's true. People of the world's poorest countries are not getting more destitute, but rather getting more prosperous. I've reported this a number of times in the past seven years, and there are always surprised and skeptical readers. Take a look at the World Bank's chart:

Poverty and child mortality in these poorest countries have been in decline for decades, while measures of education, clean water, etc. are growing. 

2020 vision 1

Joking about "2020 vision" is probably at an end now! But the need for real vision for the future never ends. There is good news and room for optimism in spite of all the scare headlines.

Are catastrophes around the world, whether related to climate or not, taking a bigger toll on people? Are more people of the world dying of disasters, or fewer people? 

image

Disasters claim more lives and more destruction in parts of the globe which are less developed. Hurricanes result in more deaths where the local economy doesn't allow for stronger residences and public structures. Stringent building codes only work where people can afford them. 

So growing economies and improved technology are making a global difference in people's lives.

(cont'd tomorrow)