John Mauldin (co-founder of Mauldin Economics and author for the Thoughts from the Frontline publication) wrote a refreshing piece to showcase all the good news that exists amidst all the bad news we hear in the media. Read excerpts from his publication below and find the full letter at the link provided at the bottom of this article.
“We haven’t had a lot of good news lately. Or, more precisely, we haven’t seen a lot of good news lately, though it does exist. We don’t see it because both regular media and social media usually focus on the bad. Positive events are occurring right now, all over the world. Lives are being saved, living standards are rising, children are learning. Good and bad can happen concurrently, sometimes in the same place. It’s not either/or.
Looking on the bright side also helps us discern the future. Things that work are usually things that will sell. When someone solves an important problem, it might be an investment opportunity.
So, let’s review some good news.
We’ll start with the man who literally wrote the book on optimism, Matt Ridley. He explained in The Rational Optimist how history shows the world getting constantly better even as bad things happen. This shouldn’t surprise us. It’s actually quite normal.
In a column last month, Matt zeroed in on a common fallacy. Some people think all our technology and progress simply generate more “stuff” that harms the environment and eventually us, too. Certainly, some of our stuff is harmful. But the broader idea—that we consume too much—is simply wrong. We are consuming less. Here’s Ridley.
In 2011 Chris Goodall, an investor in electric vehicles, published research showing that the UK was now using not just relatively less ‘stuff’ every year, but absolutely less. Events have since vindicated his thesis. The quantity of all resources consumed per person in Britain (domestic extraction of biomass, metals, minerals and fossil fuels, plus imports minus exports) fell by a third between 2000 and 2017, from 12.5 tonnes to 8.5 tonnes. That’s a faster decline than the increase in the number of people, so it means fewer resources consumed overall.
If this doesn’t seem to make sense, then think about your own home. Mobile phones have the computing power of room-sized computers of the 1970s. I use mine instead of a camera, radio, torch, compass, map, calendar, watch, CD player, newspaper and pack of cards. LED light bulbs consume about a quarter as much electricity as incandescent bulbs for the same light. Modern buildings generally contain less steel and more of it is recycled. Offices are not yet paperless, but they use much less paper.
Even in cases when the use of stuff is not falling, it is rising more slowly than expected. For instance, experts in the 1970s forecast how much water the world would consume in the year 2000. In fact, the total usage that year was half as much as predicted. Not because there were fewer humans, but because human inventiveness allowed more efficient irrigation for agriculture, the biggest user of water.”
Mauldin lists many other examples of efficiency such as, less fertilizer more production, less water for growing the same amount of food, and improving air quality. He then dives into the numerous medical advances that have been made, but you may not always hear about. Below are a few of his examples:
“The US Food & Drug Administration last year approved a new cystic fibrosis drug combination that shows amazing results. It doesn’t just relieve symptoms but attacks the disease’s genetic root. The Washington Post reports, ‘Patients who were unsure about whether they should bother attending college because they had always known they would die young are now being told they should think about planning for retirement.’
The terrifying Ebola virus is on the run. The disease that once killed thousands of Africans and threatened to spread quickly through airports around the world is becoming treatable. A new triple-antibody cocktail developed by US scientists reduces the mortality rate from 70% to as low as 6% when administered early enough.
The American Cancer Society just reported the largest-ever one-year drop in the US cancer death rate, driven mainly by lower lung cancer mortality. Newer drugs, better surgical techniques, and better diagnosis are all helping.”
Mauldin goes on to discuss how we are in fact living in a “better world”. World poverty levels are lower than ever (with over 6 billion of the population not living in extreme poverty; a number that has risen year over year since 1820). Additionally, he states:
“Child mortality is down significantly, as is the number of people without an improved drinking water source. Life expectancy is up everywhere (except for middle-age white males in the US). Genocide and war deaths are down significantly. So is crime in the US. The number of deaths from natural disasters plummeted well over 90% in the last hundred years. Death rates from air pollution are down significantly in the last 25 years.”
Thankfully, the good news doesn’t stop here. John Mauldin cites numerous more examples in the full publication, which you can find here. We will leave you with this last quote from Mauldin:
“Good things are happening and we should celebrate them. It doesn’t mean we should ignore less pleasant realities, nor does it excuse us from helping those who need it right now. Some problems can’t wait. We should do what humans always have: Welcome good when we see it, and face problems head-on.”