Sometimes you need to stop reading the headlines and start reading the trends. And one of the most significant trends affecting the human race is the steady reduction in levels of poverty, even as the human population increases. This chart is from a fascinating paper (by Maxim Pinkovskiy and Xavier Sala-i-Martin) over at VoxEU exploring long run trends in poverty and inequality.As the authors note:
Although world population has increased by about 80% over this time (World Bank 2009), the number of people below the $1 a day poverty line has shrunk by nearly 64%, from 967 million in 1970 to 350 million in 2006. In the past 36 years, there has never been a moment with more than 1 billion people in poverty, and barring a catastrophe, there will never be such a moment in the future history of the world.Something to celebrate surely? What's more, the authors point out that global income inequality is also declining, as it is in most EU countries, including Ireland. The main driver of this welcome trend is not income re-distribution but capitalism-induced economic growth. Just as it has been in Ireland - the Celtic Tiger made Ireland a more equal society, despite protestations to the contrary by the headline writers. The latest CSO SILC statistics confirm this:
In the long run we're all better off with capitalism. Though I'm not expecting to read that in the headlines any time soon ...
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