HumanProgress.org (Facebook)

Groceries cost Americans far less than they once did. The blue bars show the number of work hours needed to buy an item in 1920. The red bars show the same for 2014, and the green bars represent percentage reduction in work hours needed to obtain an item. https://buff.ly/2Idhu6t

A worker on the average wage had to work 61 hours to buy a microwave in 1979. In 2015, he needed to work only 3 hours to buy an even better product. https://buff.ly/2oQag1c

"Every day 138,000 people are lifted out of poverty. That has been the trend for the last 25 years." - Johan Norberg. https://buff.ly/2Frt8dU

92% of Americans think the share of the world population in poverty has increased or stayed the same over the last two decades. Of those who realize poverty has declined, most underestimate the extent. In fact, global poverty halved over the past 20 years.

"In half a century we have gone from 75 percent of the world living in extreme poverty, to just 9 percent." - Matt Ridley https://buff.ly/2DWVJtS

Compare the number of lives saved globally by different innovations. Click "Web Infographics" for more like this: https://buff.ly/2EhpO3H

The best-selling book The Population Bomb claimed that overpopulation would lead to "mass starvation," inciting a panic that led to human rights abuses around the world. In fact, famine has not been increasing but has become rarer. https://buff.ly/2EdOBXb

In 1856, a British male worked 149,700 hours over the course of his lifetime. By 1981 that number dropped to 88,000 hours. That's a decline of 41 percent.

Over the last 200 years or so, the world has experienced previously unimaginable improvements in standards of living. Given all this good news, the real question is why people are so unbelievably pessimistic.

Oxfam pollutes our discourse with phony statistics and false narratives in a politicized way. These findings are being used to call for a policy shift- a turn away from market-based capitalism, which has lifted billions around the world out of poverty.