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Now here's today's news, discerned differently.

If a news story claims we just experience the best decade in human history, would you

believe it?

Consider this evidence in the Spectator and Axios.

Extreme poverty has fallen below 10% of the world's population for the first time.

It was 35% in 1987. Child mortality has fallen to record low levels.

Famine has virtually gone extinct. Malaria, polio, and heart disease are all in decline.

Half of the world is now middle class or wealthier. Mortality rates for women and infants have been halved since 1990. Primary

education has become near universal in nearly all of the world. In addition, the average income of

the world's bottom 50% earners nearly doubled between 1980 and 2016.

Why then is frustration so high these days? According to Gallup, Americans are among the most stressed people in the world.

The younger we are, the angrier and more worried and stressed we are.

One explanation is that, as the Spectator article

observes, good news is no news. Geopolitical researchers Stephen Sukup and Mark Melcher note

in a recent email essay that there is a bias among the media in favor of stories that are ugly,

dark, or bloody.

Conflict, dissension, and frustration sell newspapers, or advertising spots, as the case may

be.

Sucup and Melcher discuss a second factor as well, our perceived loss of control over our lives

...