The recession which grips the US and Western Europe could become “a depression as bad as that of the 1930s” if it is not reversed. Since the depression in the 1930s was reversed through Keynesian policies stimulating consumption and investment (and therefore growth of the economy), the same resort to Keynesian policies is being made now to avert a depression. Is this wise? Ecological economist, Herman Daly, gives us cogent reasons why it is not.

The first thing to consider, Daly instructs us, is that the situation in the 1930s does not correspond to our situation now. The 1930s was an empty world in which the size of the world economy relative to the world ecosystem that contains it was small. We now live in a full world where the size of the world economy strains against the containing world ecosystem. Furthermore, the goal in the 1930s was full employment and this was properly addressed by economic growth. Currently, the goal is economic growth for its own sake and this is achieved through “off-shoring of jobs, automation, mergers, union busting, importing cheap labor, and other employment-cutting policies. The former goal of full employment has been sacrificed to the modern ideology of ‘growth in share holder value’. ”

However, growth for its own sake is becoming increasingly impossible. There has been a tripling of world population since the 1930s and the man-made artifacts that services this population – such things as “cars, houses, livestock, refrigerators, TVs, cell phones, ships, airplanes, etc.” – have more than tripled. These “living and nonliving populations” are termed dissipative structures by physicists. They require for their origination and maintenance the inflow and transformation of matter-energy from their environment (i.e. the world ecosystem) and the venting of the transformed matter-energy as wastes into that same environment – that is the dissipation of matter-energy, and hence dissipative structures. Accordingly, as the population of dissipative structures in the world economy increases, it puts an increasing strain on the world ecosystem to regenerate and to continue to provide resources as well as to absorb waste by rendering that waste innocuous through ecological recycling processes (provided the waste is capable of recycling at all by ecological processes).

Long before economic growth becomes biophysically impossible from our exceeding the regenerative and absorptive capacity of the world ecosystem, however, it becomes uneconomic. That is, the costs of economic growth begin to exceed its benefits. The economy begins to produce more illth than wealth and growth becomes uneconomic. Worse, the national accounting system represented by the GDP concels  this fact!

This transpires because the GDP “only measures ‘economic activity,’ not true income, much less welfare.” Accordingly, GDP does not “separate costs from benefits and compare them at the margin.” Rather, it just sums “up all final goods and services.” Thus, “anti-bads” are included in the GDP without having subtracted from them the “bads” that necessitated them. Other sources of income counted in the GDP as such but which shouldn’t be include “depletion of natural capital and natural services” as well as “financial transactions that are nothing but bets on debts, and then further bets on those bets.”

Because illth or the collective costs of our private market activities are not confined in their effects to the individual who cause them but are rather shared with everyone else whereas the benefits arising from the market activities are appropriated solely by the individuals concerned, illth exercises no restraint on the private market activities that cause them. Illth therefore continuously increases to degrade quality of life. Illth includes such punitive conditions as “nuclear wastes, the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, gyres of plastic trash in the oceans, the ozone hole, biodiversity loss,  climate change from excess carbon in the atmosphere, depleted mines, eroded topsoil, dry wells, exhausting and dangerous labor, exploding debt, etc.”

Because of illth, it makes sense to ask whether “growth still makes us richer, as it did back when the world was empty and the goal was full employment, rather than growth itself” or whether growth is now producing illth faster than it is producing wealth, no matter that or precisely because this is not counted in GDP.

If the answer to the question is the latter, then more growth is not the answer to the present recession. That is to say, we want to avoid more aggregate consumption now or in the future. Instead, we wish to stabilize aggregate consumption now and improve its qualitative experience through technical advancement and ethical betterment. That is, we wish to switch from growth (quantitative increase of consumption requiring more production to maintain it) to development (qualitative improvement of consumption requiring minimal production to maintain it).

This is entirely possible because as economist, Kenneth Boulding, correctly pointed out, it is from the capital stock [both natural and man-made] from which we derive our satisfactions, not from the additions to it (production) or from the subtractions from it (consumption). That is, it is the nature and quality of the capital stock that determines the quality of life, not the scale (per capita use times population) of resources required to maintain it because of production and consumption. Accordingly, it should be the objective of economic policy to minimize production and consumption, not to maximize them. Otherwise, we would only be maximizing the maintenance cost of the capital stock.

If a switch from growth to development is indicated, then this unavoidably means redistributive policies which those who profit from our present economic situation denigrate as “class warfare.” On the contrary, as Daly points out, redistributive policies are the only realistic “alternative to the class warfare that will result from the current uneconomic growth in which the dwindling benefits are privatized to the elite, while the exploding costs are socialized to the poor, the future, and to other species.”

In addition to redistributive policies, also indicated, if we are interested in moving from uneconomic growth to development, are scale policies in the resource use that actually drives the production-consumption cycle (but which is denied by mainstream economics, which views the cycle as isolated and ahistorical, with no inlet from or outlet to a containing environment!). That is, we want to impose an aggregate resource use boundary constraint on the economy compatible with ecological tolerances. This can be done expeditiously through cap-auction-trade system that will also protect us against the scale effects of increased aggregate demand in resource use resulting from the improved resource use efficiency at the individual level that the system will spur by effectively taxing depletion and pollution fundamental to resource use. Also, the auction component of the system “will raise much revenue and make it possible to tax value added (labor and capital) less because in effect we will have shifted the tax base to resource” transformation.

(Reference: Daly, Herman. 2012. “Uneconomic Growth Deepens Depression.”

http://steadystate.org/uneconomic-growth-deepens-depression/)

   Women are more easily given up medical care they needed at a time, 74.9% of respondents saying they have consulted a physician for financial reasons. Regarding age groups, 89.4% of young people aged 15-24 years did not go to the doctor when needed. In contrast, the hardest are willing to give medical care to people aged 35-49 years. Thus, 70.2% of respondents said they have not visited the doctor when they needed economic reasons. , this has an impact on society, because a sick person will have the same contribution to the national economy as a man healthy.

Studies show that every 100 Romanian 16 years of active life lost due to poor conditions of the system sănătate.2 And this is not recent. According to a report made ​​by the World Bank in 2005 on the health system in Romania, minimum wage income households were twice as willing to give medical care than others ” , said Cristian Lutan, EFPIA. situation is worrying, more so as the main problem is the health system – under-funding.

At European level, Romania is among the last places in terms of per capita health expenditures, allocating 600 Euro, while the European average is 1800 Euro. Romania ranks last in Europe in terms of percentage of GDP for health – 3.6%, which is two times lower than the European average, three times less than France, who are leaders in allocating more than 9 % of GDP and the average of African countries.

“““““““““““““““`TO WATCH, A BIG NUMBER

Goverment’s finances will play a critical role in deciding the direction of the financial markets.

The new year, as expecdtd strted on a sombre note, Analyst airing their views on the television or editors writing on the edit pages, all sounded cautionus, referring to numerous macro ecronomic challenges that india might hav to face as the year progresses. The list of issues is fairly lengy, but the ones of most concern are slowing growth, high current account and fiscal deficit and, above all, the political logjam in Delhi, which is not allowing the government to move even an inch, quite literally, All this, coupled with ever rising uncertainty on the global front, has the capcity to trun option mism into skepticism.

Howeve, the single biggest indictor thtat will dominate the discussion and possibly determine the direction of the financial world in the next couple of months is fiscal deficit,The tone was set by the prime minister in his message to the nation on the eve of New Year, He said:’; I am concerned about fiscal stgaility in future because our fiscal deficit has wrsened in the past three years, ” the proble, howeve, is that once the genie(fiscal deficit) is out of the bottle, it’s alway difficult to put it back, Europe and United SState for example, is strugllling hard to do the same,IN INdia, the dificit trget set in the begininning of the year at 4.6 percent of the GDP is all set to be breached due to the higher expenditure on account of subsidiesa nd slower revenue growth during the year,

The range of estimates flowting in the market suggests that the numbet will settle betwwen 5.1 percent and 6.1 percent of the GDP.A higher number for the current year will automatically transalte into higher deficit expectation for the next fiscal.A higher deficit means a higher simply traslates into higher borrowing by the government, elbowingout the private sector from the debt market, Aso, besides denting confidence, high government expenditure, naturally not matched by production, results in inflationalry pressure, FUrthermore, higer governmetn spending also results in hisgher imports which puts pressure on the currency.

Understanding the need of fiscal pridence perhaps more then anyone elso, the PM righly reminded the nation in ths mesage, India has paid a heavy price in the pastfor fiscal deficit profligacy.

Many of us recall thev dark days of 1990-91 when wee had to go around the world for begging for aid.’ But the question is wil his government walk tthe talk on Budget day thd let the numbers d the talk or will we again slip ito ” the dark days of 1990-91….It will be difficult for the government to contain expenditure in the vgiven circunutate, but the iplementation of reforms, especially in taxation, such Goods and Services Tax and direct. Taxes code can undo the damage to an extent, containing deficit may not impossible but willl be an uphil task, especially with polictcal commit ments like food security.

Your money

the development in the euro zone, inflation and fiscal deficit wil be the key figurs to watch out for, while inflation is howing some signs of easinyany slip on the fiscal front will put extra pressure on the markets ande possibnle undo the benefit of any small cut in the interest rates by the RBI, As we go to press, the markets are waitng for the thierd quarter numbers, and tehr results are expected to do very little to lift the mood, From here on, all erys will be on the Union Budget and the merkets will expect the government to reiterate its commitment towards refpre, amd [resemt acceptable numbers on the fiscal front.

direct.

“““““““““““““““`TO WATCH, A BIG NUMBER

Goverment’s finances will play a critical role in deciding the direction of the financial markets.

The new year, as expecdtd strted on a sombre note, Analyst airing their views on the television or editors writing on the edit pages, all sounded cautionus, referring to numerous macro ecronomic challenges that india might hav to face as the year progresses. The list of issues is fairly lengy, but the ones of most concern are slowing growth, high current account and fiscal deficit and, above all, the political logjam in Delhi, which is not allowing the government to move even an inch, quite literally, All this, coupled with ever rising uncertainty on the global front, has the capcity to trun option mism into skepticism.

Howeve, the single biggest indictor thtat will dominate the discussion and possibly determine the direction of the financial world in the next couple of months is fiscal deficit,The tone was set by the prime minister in his message to the nation on the eve of New Year, He said:’; I am concerned about fiscal stgaility in future because our fiscal deficit has wrsened in the past three years, ” the proble, howeve, is that once the genie(fiscal deficit) is out of the bottle, it’s alway difficult to put it back, Europe and United SState for example, is strugllling hard to do the same,IN INdia, the dificit trget set in the begininning of the year at 4.6 percent of the GDP is all set to be breached due to the higher expenditure on account of subsidiesa nd slower revenue growth during the year,

The range of estimates flowting in the market suggests that the numbet will settle betwwen 5.1 percent and 6.1 percent of the GDP.A higher number for the current year will automatically transalte into higher deficit expectation for the next fiscal.A higher deficit means a higher simply traslates into higher borrowing by the government, elbowingout the private sector from the debt market, Aso, besides denting confidence, high government expenditure, naturally not matched by production, results in inflationalry pressure, FUrthermore, higer governmetn spending also results in hisgher imports which puts pressure on the currency.

Understanding the need of fiscal pridence perhaps more then anyone elso, the PM righly reminded the nation in ths mesage, India has paid a heavy price in the pastfor fiscal deficit profligacy.

Many of us recall thev dark days of 1990-91 when wee had to go around the world for begging for aid.’ But the question is wil his government walk tthe talk on Budget day thd let the numbers d the talk or will we again slip ito ” the dark days of 1990-91….It will be difficult for the government to contain expenditure in the vgiven circunutate, but the iplementation of reforms, especially in taxation, such Goods and Services Tax and direct. Taxes code can undo the damage to an extent, containing deficit may not impossible but willl be an uphil task, especially with polictcal commit ments like food security.

Your money

the development in the euro zone, inflation and fiscal deficit wil be the key figurs to watch out for, while inflation is howing some signs of easinyany slip on the fiscal front will put extra pressure on the markets ande possibnle undo the benefit of any small cut in the interest rates by the RBI, As we go to press, the markets are waitng for the thierd quarter numbers, and tehr results are expected to do very little to lift the mood, From here on, all erys will be on the Union Budget and the merkets will expect the government to reiterate its commitment towards refpre, amd [resemt acceptable numbers on the fiscal front.

direct.

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Global Conference Board forecast expects world gross domestic product to grow 3.2% in 2012 and accelerate to 3.5% from 2013 to 2016. In addition, we expect an average growth of 2.7% in 2017-2025. Each period of expected rate is lower than the average 3.6% over the period 1996-2005, before the recession.

Board of Directors prediction ‘was prepared to help its members business to fit the changing world economy. Dow Jones News wires and The Wall Street Journal was given exclusive access to the forecasts.

Much of the acceleration in the medium term will come from advanced economies, including the U.S., euro area and Japan. The Council projects that the growth of developed countries “will increase from 1.3% in 2012 to 2.0% over the next four years, then decline to 1.9% from 2017 to 2025.

Emerging economies, led by China and India are set to slow, with a total GDP seen rising 5.1% in 2012, 4.9% from 2013 to 2016 and 3.4% thereafter.

When economists board ran global forecasts, the biggest surprise was the return of the bottlenecks in the growth rates of China, said Bart van Ark, chief economist at the meeting.

China is expected to grow 8.7% next year, by 6.6% over the next four years, and only 3.5% in the period 2017-2025.

Image via Wikipedia
Of course, the rate of 3.5% is based on a much higher level of GDP. The Board expects that China will overtake the U.S. as the largest economy around 2015 on a purchasing power parity.

“China has become an export-oriented economy more oriented to domestic consumption based on the demand for,” said Van Ark This change, with a slower population growth, will account for most of a slowdown in China.

The slowdown in global output will result in smaller gains in per capita income, which poses risks to both worlds developed and developing countries, the report warns.

For the advanced economies “, slower income growth will be less money available to fund health care and retirement plans,” said van Ark

The United States and the euro area have already had to confront the unsustainable trends of taxing rights programs. Slower income growth would be even smaller sources of income.

Emerging markets, per capita income growth is likely to be uneven. Van Ark said that some countries could see the growth of per capita income of just 1%, interest rates too low to improve the standard of living.

Another recession could be about to arrive, or even be here already. Some people fear it will be as bad as the last one, which reduced output in the U.S., euro zone and Japan by 5.1, 5.5 and 8.9 percent respectively.

Those GDP declines are often described in cataclysmic terms: staggering,disastrous or traumatic. Such words are vast – and dangerous – exaggerations.

Even at the trough of the last recession in 2009, real GDP in most rich countries was as high as it had been five or six years earlier – when economic conditions were not considered particularly bad.

And that comparison is too harsh on the 2009 consumer experience, which included iPhones and the Airbus A380 super jumbo jets, both better than the comparably valued goods available in 2003.

Americans and Europeans have little enough reason to moan about their recessions; citizens of the world have much less. For mankind as a whole, the small travails of the wealthy are much less important than the entry of the truly poor into the modern economy.

Industrial production in emerging economies, a good measure of that development, has increased at a heartening 6 percent annual rate over the last decade, according to the most recent data from Dutch consultants CPB. The recession reversed two years’ progress, but only briefly.

Of course, production is only one part of the economy. The recession has been harder on other parts. It led to both increased unemployment and a decline in the relative position of the poor, especially in the U.S.

Neither of those bad trends has been fully reversed. But the former was caused mostly by the end of an unsustainable excess of construction activity while the latter only amplified a decades’ old pattern.

Then a series of crises, including a 25 percent reduction in U.S. GDP, helped lead the world into the most destructive war in history. The desire not to repeat the inter-War experience spurred on the potent official response to the 2008 financial crisis.

That response basically worked, but the scary headlines and wild assertions continue, as if fascist governments were once again coming into power and hungry mobs were breaking into food stores. In fact, the few rioters have had less noble objectives: the defense of unaffordable pensions in Greece and the acquisition of branded consumer goods in the UK.

What causes the wide gap between perception and reality? I have two suggestions.

First, too many people look at the economic world largely through financial glasses. The recession made only a slight dent in industrial prosperity but the financial crisis which preceded it really was cataclysmic.

Several major institutions almost failed, central banks lent and governments borrowed as never before, and the cult of free financial markets was discredited.

And unlike the economy, the financial system has not really recovered. If anything, the crisis has broadened – from banks to governments.

Still, financial insecurity cannot really explain the prevalence of tragic rhetoric. The fear and trembling reflects a more profound error – a mistaken understanding of the economic good. Many people judge economic success only by the pace of expansion.

For them, it is not enough to have adequate or even abundant quantities of necessities, comforts and luxuries. They say that an economy is only good if it consistently provides more of all these things, and that the faster the pace of increase, the better the economy.

That approach to life has bad consequences, even ignoring the limited satisfaction provided by material things. For individuals, it is a recipe for discontent.

Those who always covet more wealth will inevitably spend much of their life feeling that they do not have enough, with or without recessions.

The irrational craving for GDP growth also distorts economic policy. It makes small, temporary and otherwise trivial setbacks in consumption – a few less days of holiday or a few more months with the old car – look like, yes, staggering disasters.

It is right for policymakers to respond strongly to genuine or possible disasters. But when economic times are good, financial conditions should be something like normal.

That is not happening right now. Despite three years of stability in rich countries and strong growth in poor ones, monetary and fiscal conditions remain extreme and policymakers, worried about another recession, are reluctant to make big changes.

The combination of financial extremism and fear of any decline in GDP could lead to a truly painful decline in output, if the already weakened global financial system becomes totally dysfunctional.

The irony would be painful. The foolish desire for constant and fast economic growth would have made those scary headlines – otherwise completely unmerited – come true.

As reported on Monday the Greek Ministry of Finance, the budget will be discussed in the next few days on the Standing Committee on Finance and latervoted by the plenary at the end of the month.

The budget envisages further austerity measures for the years 2011 and 2012 of7110 million euros, of which about 2,110 million will be raised in the remainder of the year.

The budget gap this year is about 4,300 million euros, equivalent to 2% of GDP.

The unemployment rate is expected to reach 15.2% in 2011 and is shooting16.4% in 2012, while inflation is expected to be within the 3% this year, and 2% next.

“The big problem Greece’s budget has been crossed with the profound and multiple crises in the euro area and the lack of effective and adequate institutions of global economic governance,” says the document released today in Parliament.

The text adds that ”Greece has claimed about 65,000 million in the first rescue of 110,000 million euros.”

According to projections issued on 20 September by the International MonetaryFund (IMF), Greece’s public debt could even go up to 189.1% of GDP next year.

This follows from the draft budget submitted to Parliament, which provide an economic contraction of 5.5% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) this year and 2.5% next year.

In parallel, the executive calculates a debt in 2012 of 172.7% of GDP, with a volume of 381,200 million euros, about 17,000 million more than this year.

These data are the counterpoint and the consequence of the severe measures promoted by Athens to reduce the deficit, which rose from 15.6% in 2009 to 8.5% this year.

deficit

To achieve the goal of lowering the deficit to 6.8% in 2012 will need to raise an additional € 7110. The Greek Council of Ministers admitted yesterday that the holein the budget for this year is about 4,300 million euros, representing 2% of GDP.

The additional funds must come from increased taxes and cut state spending until the end of 2012.

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate will reach 15.2% this year, with more than 800,000 workers unemployed, and shot up to 16.4% in 2012.

The Confederation of Public Servants ADEDY ensures that employees have already lost 40% of its purchasing power by the crisis, which will add yet anotherloss of between 20 and 40% with the new measures the Government intends toimpose.

In protest, along with the Confederation of GSEE private sector workers, has announced a new 24-hour general strike for next Wednesday and again on 19October.

Government measures include the elimination of bonuses for staff and obligation to pay taxes from income of 5,000 euros per year instead of the current 12,000 euros.

Those from Business Insider did a top economic predictions for 2030, considering the evolution of a barrel of oil and GDP and the number of inhabitants.

The population will include 8.8 billion people, compared to 6.8 billion in 2010. Meanwhile, the number of people in the U.S. will reach 365 million people, up from 307 million last year.

And the price of a barrel of oil will rise a staggering pace. So, in 2030, will cost $ 308 a barrel, compared to an average price of 35% in 2000.

Checkout the U.S. healthcare system will increase by 88% to 9 trillion dollars a year over the next 10 years. And the number of elderly people in the U.S. will advance – from 54 million to 40 million last year. Surprise, but the number of people in prison in America will grow at a faster pace than the population here. In 2030, 9.4 million people will be closed up 14% from 9% growth rate in the U.S. population. In the U.S., Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will reach 30, 9 trillion dollars from 14 trillion in 2010. Meanwhile, China’s GDP will be 40 trillion, compared to 10 trillion last year. In addition, because America will reach 32 trillion dollars. ’s population consumes 31% more energy and carbon dioxide emissions will amount to 50.678 million tonnes.

Image via Wikipedia

Economic growth in France stagnated in the second quarter, raising pressure on the government to cut spending and abolish tax breaks to convince financial markets that meet its debt reduction goals.

The French statistics office said gross domestic product growth (GDP) was 0 percent in the period from April to June against the growth in the first quarter of 0.9 percent, the best in nearly five years.

The main cause was a fall in household consumption, which declined 0.7 percent from the first quarter, a particularly worrying sign for an economy that, unlike Germany, it depends on the force of domestic demand.
Economists polled by Reuters had given an average forecast of a rise of 0.3 percent.

After the European Central Bank took action this week to defend the bonds from Italy and Spain, the fire was concentrated markets in France amid rumors about the health of their banks and the soundness of its AAA rating.

A stagnant economy does not help the situation.

Finance Minister of France, Francois Baroin, downplayed the quarterly data, arguing that it was no surprise after the strong start of the year.

He said the Government will not revise downward their forecasts for growth and meet its goals of cutting debt, after President Nicolas Sarkozy on Wednesday ordered his ministers to find new ways to lower the deficit.

The debt reduction plan is based on a GDP growth of 2 percent in 2011 to 2.25 percent in 2012 and 2.5 percent on average in both 2013 and 2014.

A recent IMF report offered a less optimistic, forecasting growth of 2.1 percent for 2011 from 1.9 percent in 2012 and 2 percent by 2013.

France, Italy, Spain and Belgium set the ban on short selling of financial stocks on Thursday night in a coordinated attempt to restore confidence in markets hit by rumors and higher costs of credit.

Economic recession, what is that and why is it bad ( and why is it really not bad)?

Recession is when the GDP (gross domestic product) of a country does not grow over two quarters ( half a year, economists and such use quarters). And what is bad about that? Well it damn should be growing! If the total output of your country is growing that must mean you are in the same place you were before, but your not. Your population has risen. so there is less per person. But now we can see we are out of recession, most countries GDPs grew last quarter. So we are out of that shit, we are growing again, the media then starts spouting stuff about the growth being less than expected. Well anyone can expect growth, if I expect the GDP of the USA to grow by 0.1% next quarter then a) I would be an idiot b) I could publish an article saying growth was at 70 times the expected rate! You can do that trick.

Unemployment.

We can admit that a lot of people are unemployed, but then again we are not in our society lacking in products are we? There is unemployment because the jobs are full. There are excess people. We have excess because we have been doing so well we can support that. And an inevitable fact of an economy growing is unemployment. Competition lowers prices and therefore is a good thing? With that comes some companies getting bigger, some get smaller. You know how it works and so do I. This creates it, so do companies shutting down. And some people a) cannot work or b) cannot be bothered to work. 

Poverty..

Now we can admit to knowing there is a lot of people who are poorer than the rest of us. Wait a minute? That’s what we call relative poverty. Some people are relatively poor just like a 1.2million pound house is a shit hole in comparison to a 20million pound house. So shut your shit. But then there is the matter of…..

Destitution.

This is where people are..

‘ Absolute poverty or destitution refers to being unable to afford basic human needs, which commonly includes clean and fresh water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter. About 1.7 billion people are estimated to live in absolute poverty today.’

Thanks Wikipedia. Yeah so we can see that’s a bad thing. And Wikipedia isn’t known for being wrong ( it is statistically more accurate than Encyclopedia Britannica). So thats 1.7billion. Or roughly 2/7 of the people on this planet. So if you lined up 7 people 2 of them would be like that, with no acsesss to these things. Mostly this is in africa and such, south america and india. But this leads on to my point….

Geography/History lesson for you….

Look back to England in the 1800s, it looked a lot like that for a lot of people, then it got better, it revolutionised. Then it spread to europe. Then across to america. By the 1900s everything looks a lot better. Then by 1950 those places were awesome, yay! This 150 period of revolution started here first, we can see it in action in africa. We have seen a massive part of it this year, people gaining democracy ( some) in the Arab Spring. China and India and Brazil are booming economys and conditions there are getting a whole lot better. They are where England and the USA were around 70-80 years ago. So even though things are shit for 2/7 people now we can be safe in the knowledge that this is the best it has been for everyone everywhere ever and it will get better for all of us. So the next time you read about starvation in africa think about the fact that the country your are in now was very much like that not so long a go..

Time since our living conditions were like that= 150-250 years ago.

Time since we started improving rapidly= 4000 years ago

Time we have been around as a species= 250,000 years

Time the universe has been here= 14,000,000,000 years (aprox)

Thanks for reading:)