Most people on the planet wake up each day thinking things are getting worse. It is little wonder, given what they routinely read in newspapers or see on television. But this gloomy mood is a problem because it feeds into scare stories about how climate change will end in Armageddon.The fact is that the world is mostly getting better. For starters, average global life expectancy has more than doubled since 1900 and is now more than 70 years. Because the increase has been particularly marked among the poor, health inequality has declined massively. Moreover, the world is more literate, child labour is decreasing and we are living in one of the most peaceful times in history.
In addition, people are better off economically. During the past 30 years, average global per capita income has almost doubled, leading to widespread reductions in poverty. In 1990, almost four in 10 people were poor; today, that’s less than one in 10. That has helped to transform the way people live. Between 1990 and 2015, for example, the proportion of the world’s population practising open defecation halved to 15 per cent. And in the same period, 2.6 billion people gained access to improved water sources, bringing the global share up to 91 per cent.
These changes also have improved the environment. Globally, the risk of death from air pollution — by far the biggest environmental killer — has declined substantially; in low-income countries, it has almost halved since 1990.
Doom and gloom distort our world view and can lead to bad policies. The future is bright and we need smart decisions to keep it so.
Dr. Bjorn Lomborg is president of the Copenhagen Consensus Center and visiting professor at Copenhagen Business School. He has been named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world. His numerous books include The Skeptical Environmentalist, Cool It, and How to Spend $75 Billion to Make the World a Better Place.