If one were to sift through our most prominent newspapers, surf
through our most trustworthy Web sites and watch our most reliable
news coverage on television, one would find little more than an
elaborate mosaic of a world gone mad.
We hear that the war on Iraq has failed, that the economy of the
United States is on the brink of collapse, and on a broader scale,
that the conditions of the environment and the comforts of our
lifestyles are on the decline.
With presidential elections approaching, the opposition
candidates repeat this depressing message as cynics in the business
of punditry forecast doom and gloom.
But without problems and crises, the pundits would have no jobs,
the candidates would have no case and the role of the media would
be weakened. It is for these reasons that much of the positive
““ and real ““ news about the world is only sparsely
addressed.
Consider, for example, the recent invasion of Iraq and the
much-expressed failure of post-war reconstruction. According to
Paul Bremer, the Coalition Authority administrator in Iraq, allied
forces have already completed 13,000 reconstruction projects. Eight
months ago, there were no police and no functional courts of law in
Iraq. Today, there are more than 40,000 policemen and 400
functioning courts. Eight months ago, the people of Iraq had no
political power. Today, Baghdad alone boasts 88 advisory councils
and Iraq is managed by 25 representative ministers. Iraq is also
back in the game of international politics. Its embassies will soon
reopen in 30 countries.
The U.S. economy is likewise underestimated and attacked. But
according to Reuters, the economy is doing famously. In its third
quarter, the gross domestic product increased by a rate of 8.2
percent, the largest quarter gain in nearly 20 years.
Glen Somerville writes, “Consumer spending, bolstered by
tax cuts, grew at a revised 6.4 percent annual pace in the third
quarter. … Corporate profits after tax climbed at a 10.6 percent
annual rate during the quarter. … Commerce said it was the
strongest pickup in profits since a 12.4 percent jump in the fourth
quarter of 1992.” And even in the face of Southern
California’s mass strikes, the nation added 57,000 jobs in
November and 328,000 jobs in the last four months to its improving
economic record.
But these successes should not come as a surprise because the
world as a whole has been improving and progressing throughout all
of its history. In their book “It’s Getting Better All
the Time,” late economist Julian Simon and Stephen Moore
demonstrate this. They document the 100 greatest trends of the last
century and, in so doing, refute a bulk of the doom-saying about
the environment, poverty and life expectancy that is prevalent
today.
Take, for instance, the state of lakes, rivers and streams. The
authors write, “U.S. lakes, rivers and streams have been much
less polluted over the past quarter century, and this trend is
toward continued improvement. … Industrial water pollution has
plummeted since 1980. Organic wastes have fallen by 46 percent,
toxic organics by 99 percent and toxic metals by 98 percent.”
In 1972, only 36 percent of streams were usable for fishing and
swimming. By 1994, the figure was up to 86 percent.
Environmentalists are quick to claim that natural resources are
diminishing. But history has disproved this claim also. In a
widely-publicized event in 1980, free-market economist Julian Simon
and prominent environmentalist Paul Ehrlich made a bet on this very
issue. Simon had long claimed that natural resources became more
and more abundant because of the technological innovations sparked
by the human mind ““ what he called the “ultimate
resource.”
Ehrlich, on the other hand, predicted shortages in these
resources. The rules of the bet were as follows: Ehrlich would
choose any five metals. If, in the next 10 years, the combined
price of the metals increased (i.e, the metals became more scarce),
then Ehrlich would win. If the price decreased (i.e, the metals
became more abundant), then Simon would win. Sure enough, in 1990,
not only the collective price of the metals, but also the
individual prices of each metal had decreased.
The world is a better place than most believe. We breathe clean
air, get a good education and have exceptional health. In the last
hundred years, life expectancy has increased, racism has declined
and the environment has improved.
But most notable is the following observation of Julian Simon
and Stephen Moore: “Over the past 30 years the freest nations
have had the fastest growth rate: about 2.5 percent per year per
capita. The least free nations have actually had negative growth
rates over the same periods. … Life expectancies are 21 years
longer for those born in free nations than for those born in
non-free nations.”
Given that in this analysis, the authors classified the United
States as the freest of the free nations, we have ample reason to
be happy and grateful this holiday season.
Hovannisian is a first-year history and philosophy student.
E-mail him at ghovannisian@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to
viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.