Nicholas Kristof:
One survey found that two-thirds of Americans believed that the proportion of the world population living in extreme poverty has almost doubled over the last 20 years. Another 29 percent believed that the proportion had remained roughly the same.
That’s 95 percent of Americans — who are utterly wrong. In fact, the proportion of the world’s population living in extreme poverty hasn’t doubled or remained the same. It has fallen by more than half, from 35 percent in 1993 to 14 percent in 2011.
More numbers:
In 1990, more than 12 million children died before the age of 5; this toll has since dropped by more than half. . . . More kids than ever are becoming educated, especially girls. In the 1980s, only half of girls in developing countries completed elementary school; now, 80 percent do.
In my optimistic moods I believe that humanity is passing through a narrow valley of ecological ruin and social upheaval, soon to emerge into a new world of stable populations and ever increasing wealth.
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