Counter-factuals

I love a good counter-factual: and in this case I mean data that pricks a hole in the balloon of modern liberalism. I just ran across an excerpt from a book called "Why Capitalism is Good for the Soul" by Peter Saunders.

"The way this [capitalism] has enhanced people’s capacity to lead a good life can be seen in the spectacular reduction in levels of global poverty, brought about by the spread of capitalism on a world scale. In 1820, 85% of the world’s population lived on today’s equivalent of less than a dollar per day. By 1950, this proportion had fallen to 50%. Today it is down to 20%.... In 1900, the average life expectancy in the “less developed countries” was just thirty years. By 1960, this had risen to forty-six years. By 1998, it was 65 years. To put this extraordinary achievement into perspective, the average life expectancy in the poorest countries at the end of the twentieth century was fifteen years longer than the average life expectancy in the richest country in the world—Britain—at the start of the century."

Name for me the political or economic system that can compete with Capitalism for simple human betterment. (And I do not mean the Crony Capitalism - or Corporatism as we exercise it today.) Even hobbled by politics, free markets have enough residual energy to raise up an entire planet's prosperity. Oh, what we could do with truly free markets. (Dream on, boy.)