IN ESSENCE...:

To 'Save the Children' Capitalism is the Answer (Rich Lowry, 9/22/07, Real Clear Politics)

It is no coincidence that as UNICEF was reporting the drop in child mortality, the World Bank was reporting global poverty rates had fallen as part of an extraordinary worldwide economic boom. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson calls it "far and away the strongest global economy I've seen in my business lifetime."

The global economy is growing at a 5 percent clip, higher than the 3 percent of the period from 1960 to 1980 and the 4.7 percent from 1960 to 1980. As U.S. News & World Report points out, "Gross global product is three times as big as it was in 1970 so the global economy is not only growing faster, but there's more to grow.

In a worldwide instance of trickle-down economics, the growth is diminishing the ranks of the poor. According to the World Bank, developing countries have averaged 3.9 percent growth since 2000, contributing "to rapidly falling poverty rates in all developing regions over the past few years." In 1990, 1.25 billion people lived on less than $1 a day. In 2004, less than a billion did, even though world population increased 20 percent in the interim.

When a developing country gets richer, it means that people living there are less likely to be malnourished and - as infrastructure improves - more likely to have access to clean water and to sanitation. This is a boon to health.

...pretty nearly the whole world is America in the '90s.

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 22, 2007 8:06 AM