 This is Puro Pelka with Michael Pelka only on the blaze radio network All right This is your own book filling in for Michael Pelka. It's our last day. Mike is back tomorrow and Please please don't hold him responsible for everything that I've said. I thought this morning We do something a little different. I thought for a change Here's a radical thought. I thought for change we talk about some positive things some good stuff Happening in the world at least for the first hour or so and then we'll see where we go from there We can't stay too positive for too long. I don't think that's allowed by the rules of talk radio But but let's let's really consider this. I mean there's so much negativity out there. There's so much bad stuff I mean objectively bad stuff. There's so much Complaining and and real problems that exist in the world. We forget and and I think I think people are psychologically wired to really Focus on the negative to focus on the risks to focus on on on the world coming to an end I mean One piece of good news is hey the world didn't end and we had a full eclipse on Monday I mean that's that's got to be good news I'm sure there were some millennial cults out there that were just predicting the end of the world But there's a lot of good news There is a lot of good stuff happening in the world and they has been for a long time Again in spite of the negativity in spite of Donald Trump in spite of his rhetoric There's a lot to celebrate in the world in in which we live and I want to dedicate at least some time for this I'm also you know Interested in in hearing from you guys, you know if you guys You know, what's positive in your world? What's being positive in your world? What what would you say? I mean some of the positive trends over the last five ten twenty thirty years That you've noticed that you would like to talk about 888 9000 3393 888 900 3393 Looking for positive stories looking for you know things that That have improved life or improved life for you have improved life in the world If you think that it just they're just cool and an important and good Leave the negatives for later. Right. We're just focusing on some some good news for a change, right? So I'm just gonna pick a date Somewhat arbitrarily, but because I have some data on it. So it's not completely arbitrary and that that date is is 1990 and let me let me also say this before we get into and I want to compare 1990 to today and and and look at some trends and look at what's happened, but Let me give you the standard we talked yesterday with Alex Epstein and we talked about the standard How do you how do you evaluate? You know whether we're better off or worse off than we were in the past if if global Warming is actually hurting us or helping us. How do you evaluate these things and my standard is always is Is it good for human being is human life better off is individual human life better off today than it was in the past and You know, I've been accused of being a globalist and in a sense I'm a globalist in a sense that I care about human life. I don't just care about American life I don't just care about My neighbor's life. I you know, I value human beings and I care Globally are things better off or not. I'm not a globalist. Don't don't stop panicking guys. Don't you know In a sense of I don't believe in global government I don't believe in global governance, but I certainly believe in as we'll talk about global trade and and I care that you know about what's happening in the world and It's interesting that a lot of the good statistics a lot of the the most positive things happening in the world they're actually happening outside the United States for a variety of reasons partially because We've been screwing it up for the last 50 years but But even in the US we'll talk about that as well. Good stuff is happening Let's start by the kind of the big story the big headline story of the last 30 years should be if you actually You know, if we actually had a media that was actually Engaged in reporting important news rather than important negative news or promoting a particular Ideology or particular political point of view if they actually were focused on what is going on in the world You'd think that's what they and and positive or negative probably the most important story of the last 30 years is the fact that there are Somewhere between 1 to 2 billion people billion with a B Who were poor in? 1990 Desperately poor in 1990 and I'm not What the word what it's called extreme poverty are not in extreme poverty anymore? so Extreme poverty is defined. I think by by the UN or by somebody as a dollar 90 a day In 1990 1.9 billion people 1.9 billion people 37 percent of the entire population of the world 37 percent of the entire population of the world almost 40 percent of The entire population of the world lived in what is defined as extreme poverty That was 1990 27 years ago less than 30 years ago, right almost 40 percent now If you go back far enough, right? If you go back to 300 years ago a hundred percent of the world lived in extreme poverty Extreme poverty that you cannot imagine today how bad it was So 1.9 billion people just 27 years ago lived in extreme poverty Today or at least 2015 two years ago The number was 700 million still a huge number But only 9.6% of the population of those notice from 1990 to 2015 the population of the world grew quite a bit and yet the number of people in extreme poverty shrunk dramatically dramatically From almost 40 percent to less than 10 percent the first time in human history That fewer than 10 percent are people on the planet living in extreme poverty a 74.1 percent decline 74.1 percent decline Now why did this happen? Did this happen because of? foreign aid Did this happen because of anti-poverty programs? initiated by the United Nations Did this happen because of philanthropists like Bo gates and others spending gazillions of dollars all over the world No No, almost the entire decline if not the entire decline happened because of one simple idea gaining a little bit of traction One can only imagine if it gained a lot of traction a little bit of traction in the world out there and that idea is The value of individual life the value of individual freedom in a sense Individualism not as a complete system of ideas not as a well understood philosophical principle But just a respect for the individual and a respect for the individuals freedom and Therefore an unshackling of the individual and you see this primarily across Asia You see in the beginnings of it across Africa You you definitely seeing that right in Eastern Europe remember 1990 a year before you know The the Soviet Empire completely dissolves so you're seeing you're seeing Individualism this unshackling the individual the growth of individual freedom Happen all over Asia Eastern Europe in the beginnings really just the beginnings in Africa and the consequences are astounding Poverty drops dramatically in places like India which started embracing Elements a little bit of freedom free markets in the early 1990s some liberalization trade liberalization. We'll talk about trade more opening up Less slightly less emphasis on the caste system, which is which is this really racist Maybe racist is not the right term. Maybe it's not by race, but you're born into a particular caste You're born into a particular position in life, and that's it. It's fixed in stone. It cannot be changed a little bit Like the feudal system in in in Europe But but even more extreme of the the pre-capitalist era in Europe and a shift slow shift I think I mean I wish it was more dramatic in India towards more freedom more capitalism more markets and The result is explosion in economic growth dramatic decline in poverty dramatic increase in the participation of people in in In business, you know a dramatic increase in the number of high-tech companies, you know huge dramatic improvement in the in the Indian economy the same of course in China China again small increases small You know of the government stepping back and allowing individual freedom if you went to China in The 1970s what you saw are masses of people Dressed in gray dressed the same heads down shuffling along with no personality no Life to them dirt poor in the countryside literally starving and And today you go to Shanghai and it's one of the most astounding cities in the world skyscrapers everywhere Dynamic people engage their vibrant. They dress In vibrant engaging ways. They they look Western in a sense of how they dress and much of how they behave There's energy They they they're walking straight. They you know, they're proud of their achievements The buildings are tall. Yes, there's still poverty in China But nothing like they used to be and there's nobody dying of starvation hundreds of millions of people Have come out of poverty not just extreme poverty any kind of poverty just in China over the last 30 years because of more freedom because of Treating the individual with respect allowing the individual to have some freedom now not fully There's still a lot of oppression in China and we'll get to some of the real problems that have to do with trade with China, but Essentially Freedom to the extent that it is practiced capitalism in other words free markets respect for private property respect for the rule of law Capitalism to the extent that it is tried It eradicates poverty and we've seen it in Asia and and it's not just these places look at Hong Kong Where poor people arrive and they don't stay poor in Hong Kong look at Singapore look at South Korea Do you know that South Korea in the 1950s? Was poorer than North Korea post-war South Korea in the Korean War was poorer than North Korea Today it's one of the richest countries in the world and and that means individuals are wealthy Taiwan and and and even countries like Vietnam a Much much better than they used to be Wates of extreme poverty in all these countries have plummeted Now we should be celebrating that we should be out in the streets. This is fantastic news It's fantastic news for everybody if you care about human beings And I know you know we objectivists. I'm an objectivist I a Dedicated to the philosophy of iron man. We're supposed to be the people of the world We selfish are not care about anybody else And yet it's all those people out there who say they care about people Really don't they don't care about the world. They don't care, you know, they have they have no benevolence towards other people I'm hugey benevolent because I'm selfish because I care about my own life I know the value of life and when I see other people suffering You know, that's sad because I know what's what they're capable of. I know what's possible I know what they what what it feels like to be successful in life to have a good life and I also know that when other people are successful It helps me It helps me it makes my life better And that's true for my neighbor next door But and then but that's also true for somebody across the world and we'll talk about how Progress in China and progress in India has made life in America better dramatically better in my view in spite of The demonization of these countries the demonization of trade. I mean It is nuts in my view, but trade inch China has made this country so much better So You know, I value human beings and when I see human life improving that is a cause of celebration But there's also another aspect of this Why is their life improving? Why is their life improving can't we learn something from the fact that their life is improving now I think we could have learned that lesson just by looking at our own history And how did we go from 300 years ago all of us living under extreme poverty to where we are today? We could have learned from that but given that we didn't learn from that Maybe we can learn by looking at these other countries and when you look at these other countries You see the same story over and over and over again even countries today That see improving economics improving wealth creation Improving standard of livings in Africa have the same lesson If you respect property rights To some extent even like in China if you respect contract laws if you expect individual freedom to choose their own profession To to to you know to deal in the marketplace freely at least to some extent wealth is created People people are more productive and the world around them is a better place a much much better place Everywhere everywhere in the world doesn't matter what race you are doesn't matter what ethnic group you are doesn't matter What continent you're on none of that matters? None of that matters people when they are free a productive and creative and And and and get out of poverty fairly quickly now You know you have to build infrastructure freedom can't survive by itself, right? Anarchy doesn't work what you need is a legal system what you need is the protection of individual rights what you need To some extent again what you need is some kind of government That protects property rights with respect property rights And you have that at least to some extent In places like india and china and and elsewhere right so way you have that We have governments that allow individuals to be free within the con and and and at the same time establish A system that respects their property that's You know, that's when human beings do well all right when I take a quick break you're listening to your own book on the Apelka Michael Pelka show. We'll be right back after this break You're listening to pure opelka with Michael Pelka on the blaze radio network Actually, it's still your own book here, but but Michael be back tomorrow. So here's a he's an exercise We have to go to another break in like two and a half minutes. He is another exercise for you guys Think back those of you old enough like I am think back to 1990 What were you doing? What was life like day to day life? What kind of gadgets were using what kind of Stuff were you doing? How much wealth did you have? What size home did you have? What kind of work were you doing and and compare to today? Just do that Just just contemplate that over the next break and if you feel like you give me a call and let me know what you think You know and what what what that was like eight eight eight nine zero zero two nine three eight eight nine zero zero three three nine three um, let me tell you In 1990 I was a student graduate student. I was getting my phd I had a one-year-old son I um, I was living on I don't know something like 15 000 a year in austin texas Uh, the largest expense Uh, we actually kept track of our monthly expenses because we had so little money. My largest expense was diapers Um going out was like going to mcdonald's or going, you know, somewhere to get a banana split That was like whoa that was being extravagant um, I had a little computer a mac se 30 se 30 And uh, it had a little black and white screen And it had as much memory As I was going to say a memory stick, but there is no memory stick so small As to have the total memory of that computer That's how little memory that can 60 um So tiny little apartment Projector today. I mean it's like it can't even compare right? I just moved to the us three years earlier My conclusion is This is still a country where if you come you work hard You really devote yourself to making your life better You can still achieve you can still succeed You know, I'm living the good life and now I have two monitors a massive computer. I have like seven different computing devices In my home 30 all More powerful all more powerful than the computer that's setting the man to the moon During the apollo mission Life is pretty good. Life is pretty good. All right When we come back we'll talk more about good news Listening to your run book on the michael pelka show five right back On the blaze radio network So to those of you who are regular uh, pelka listeners, uh, and if you've enjoyed the last few days Uh, you can join us. Uh, I have a regular show here on the blaze Same place on the internet Every sunday every sunday between two To four east coast time between two to four east coast time. You've got the iran brook show on the blaze. I hope Some of you will join us on sunday. Why limit your, uh, blaze network radio to, uh, To, uh, middle of the week or to just the week weekends a great time to, uh To listen to good stuff on the blaze. All right, so we were talking about How amazing the world is I know that, you know, I I'm I'm thinking I'm maybe I'm boring you guys because I know people people are just not they don't seem interested In good news Right, there's just not a market for good news. This is why the press doesn't cover it. You think the press is just all negative The reason the press is negative is because we the consumers are not interested in hearing good news So our headlines are always negative that you almost never hear about the good stuff going on in the world but We're gonna we're gonna keep on going we're gonna keep on going a lot of good news still to cover, right? So we talk about kind of this this decline in poverty This is uh, you can see this in in the fact that world hunger by a variety of different measures I mean all these organizations have different measures for this stuff has declined by 40 percent Since 1990 child mortality has gone down by more than half And uh, you know by every one of these measures of human well being There are fewer people who are poor. There are fewer people who are struggling. There are fewer people who are hungry There are fewer people who are just dying out there particularly particularly kids Where it's if you will Which you know, it's curable Because of the huge advantage since we in the west have made in medicine And you know, those are now accessible To anybody who has a little bit of money all over the world That that's a huge advantage one of the huge advantages china and india and all these other countries have Is that a lot of the capital Particularly a lot of the thinking that has gone into developing new technologies developing new health treatments Uh, how to develop markets how to protect property rights has already been done They don't have to invest in that they can just capitalize on it. Good for them. That's great They should be a little bit more thankful to us, but anyway, that's good for them. That's great I mean We live in an amazing world in an amazing global world and one of the things One of the things that that is amazing about this world is our ability to see it Ability to travel and see it Do you know that airline tickets on average again globally have declined by over 50 percent in real dollars over the last 27 years since 1990 50 percent It's much much cheaper today to see the world to travel To go to asia or to africa or to europe or anyway And and once you get there everything is cheaper hotels are cheaper cars are cheaper travel everything about travel It's cheaper Then suddenly there used to be a hundred years ago where nobody traveled anywhere where it took months or weeks to go anywhere Today you could travel from l8 to to new york and what a hundred bucks I mean, yeah, the discount airlines and this is what's changed Is as we complain bitterly all the time. Oh, there's not enough room in the seats And it's so crowded and they don't give us, you know, three course meals anymore and we all we get is peanuts But but that's because that's what we want Right, we have gravitated towards discount airlines because you know what the money's more important to us than comfort That's the conclusion all airlines have come to right most people are not willing to pay extra for comfort What they do want is to get from point a to point b at the lowest cost possible. So you've got Dozens of new airlines all over the world Over the developed over the last 20 years that specialize in discount flying You can fly there's some flights in europe that you can get for like under 20 bucks Under 20 bucks you can get on an airplane and fly because they're selling their excess capacity And and and you know these discount airlines are relatively profitable and uh, and and you know, they're doing great They've in many respects replaced big cumbersome state subsidized airlines and you've got them all over europe all over asia And all over the united states and and that's the sector that's going the fastest in the airline business And it's making it possible for us to travel all over the world At half the price and a number of people traveling has gone through the roof So the number of passengers traveling has increased dramatically some more of us Are traveling around the world and seeing the world That's got to be a good thing It again my standard for what's good is that which enhances individual life and seeing the world I think enhances individual life It's fun It's educational You know, I don't believe all cultures are the same, but I do believe there's a lot to be learned from observing other cultures And it's interesting And and some of what's to be learned from observing other cultures is what not to do Some of the reason to go to countries where there is real poverty Is is to remember what that's like to get a sense of what that's like Remember not remember in the sense that You ever lived that way because when you go to cambodia and you see real poor people you've never lived That poor but our ancestors did And something something made it possible for us not to live that poor anymore And it's good for us once in a while to remember what that something is It's called freedom. It's called capitalism all the stuff that we're abandoning That's what led to this fantastic life And if we want to go back to living in real poverty, then yeah Embrace the agenda Of the regressives on the left and on the right Abandon global trade Abandon free markets regulate google and amazon and uh, yeah break them all up That is the path To poverty that is the path To destructiveness All right, so airline Airlines who would have thought that there's good news in the airline industry, but the fact is it's cheaper We travel more more of the world is accessible. They have added hundreds of additional airports are now accessible to everyday travelers Then were available in the past they used to be the story that oh, what about those little rural airports Nobody's going to go there if we just leave it to private enterprise particularly in europe and in asia This was the story. You hear it today. Oh, we've got to subsidize rural access to phones and internet and all this stuff Because competition won't go there well All these little airports you can now go above the arctic circle In europe i think in no way to a little airport in or no way you can go all All kinds of god forsaken places little airports and and who's leading the way Discount airlines Because they they can provide cheap transportation there. They don't don't do it every day, but they can provide enough To justify the route they can make money off of it and people want to go to these places And and traffic again air like traffic through the roof We're enjoying life This is good All right, we've i've got a few more positives that i want to talk about But we have to take a break. We have to pay the bills So you're listening to uran brook on the mike apoca show on the blaze radio network and we'll be right Back after this Pure apoca this mike apoca on the blaze radio network All right, this is uh uran brook and we're talking about positive things today Which is kind of bizarre because nobody ever talks about positive things And i underestimated in the previous segment i underestimated um The the the degree to which global f is have come down so in 1995 The average round trip ticket globally was over a thousand dollars The average round trip ticket today is is close to 250 dollars and then if you look at um The number of airports served Just between Let me see just between 1995 It was just under 10 000 airports today. It's almost 20 000 airports Where do they find 10 000 additional airports? How did where did those come from? I mean if that is an indication Of human world being around the world of the fact that people are traveling They have enough money to travel that there's the man for this travel And that their airports in 10 000 new places that didn't exist in 1995 That's pretty amazing. That's stunning. That's good news And I can go visit those. There's a few airports. I haven't been to yet Not many but a few This is so You know air travel is pretty amazing, but but across the board, right? I haven't even gotten to technology We'll get to that in a minute, but Here's one that that It kind of surprises a lot of people because of the rhetoric Particularly in this campaign. I mean if you'd listen to Donald trump during the campaign Then your sense of crime in america would be that it's never been worse um, I mean really there are there are Crime is everywhere motor rates are skyrocketing Uh, people are being murdered particularly by legal aliens, but generally or by immigrants generally Um that crime was just out of control out of control. We live in the worst of times When it comes to violent crime in america, that's I mean carnage in the streets I think was donald trump's phase and this wasn't just during the election This was his in his inauguration address, which I thought was the most embarrassing And ignorant and depressing inauguration address ever Carnage in the streets And yet when you actually look at crime statistics 1990 was about the peak 1990 91 was like The most violent period in american history In terms of domestic violent in terms of violence in the u.s. So violent crime And since then we've seen a steady Almost uninterrupted decline in violence to the point where two years ago Was one of the most peaceful periods in terms of violent crime in the united states ever ever Now we've seen a slight increase Uh last year and and potentially this year. I'm not sure what the stats on this year Probably declined because after all donald trump's in it is president now. So things are getting better. Um I'm being cynical, but you know, so so but Compared to the 1990s early 90s certainly compared to the 70s and 80s Violent crime in the united states is way way down That's pretty amazing More people are working today I mean in spite of the growth of the u.s. Population in spite of computers in spite of uh mechanization in spite of uh assembly lines of robots More people literally the actual number of people working today is is higher than it's ever been So it turns out technology doesn't destroy jobs. It creates jobs And they're making more money than they did in 1990. I'm sorry all those statistics That say that wage is a stagnant. It's just not true overall People are now they're not making as much as they should two minutes um Not making as much as they could be But you know, they're making more money And that money buys more stuff cooler stuff better stuff high quality stuff Just more efficient effective stuff A standard of living a quality of life It's just higher today. We live longer. How about that life expectancy is still increasing now? It turns out not if you're white uh lower middle class And I think between the ages of 35 and 55 that age group is actually like their life expectancies declining Because of drugs alcohol and suicide and maybe we'll get to that later. So that's pretty depressing news But that's within the context of pretty much everything else Given those stats, uh, you know pretty good You know now it's not as good as it could be and we're going to talk about that It could be much much better one minute and when we get back Uh after this break in the second hour, I want to talk about why Life is better. Why all these things are good and talk a little bit about technology about how that's made our life better We'll talk about that but but what is behind it all? And uh, how we can accelerate it how how can we make it? Even better even faster life You know to make life even more fulfilling flourishing and successful 30 almost everybody So, uh, we're going to talk about that in, um, you know after the top of the hour after we take this break Here's some depressing news And we'll get back to some good news and cars. That's what's really important. What is the cause? All right You're listening to your own book On the mike palka show, uh today and uh, that'll be it We will talk to you again after this break