In 1990, 35% of the world lived in extreme poverty

[Recursion]

Today, the number is 10.7%. Lack of access to toilets has been cut in half.

We need to stop conceding that the past 3 decades have been some kind of failure. The past 3 decades are what the destruction of world poverty looks like.

[jaysunb]

1. Globalization n/t

[ret5hd]

2. Would love a source, etc.

Thanks, I hope this is true.

[Recursion]

5. Here you go

http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/poverty/overview

There has been marked progress on reducing poverty over the past decades. The world attained the first Millennium Development Goal target—to cut the 1990 poverty rate in half by 2015—five years ahead of schedule, in 2010. Despite the progress made in reducing poverty, the number of people living in extreme poverty globally remains unacceptably high. And given global growth forecasts poverty reduction may not be fast enough to reach the target of ending extreme poverty by 2030.

According to the most recent estimates, in 2013, 10.7 percent of the world’s population lived on less than US$1.90 a day, compared to 12.4 percent in 2012. That’s down from 35 percent in 1990.
This means that, in 2013, 767 million people lived on less than $1.90 a day, down from 881 million in 2012 and 1.85 billion in 1990.

There's a lot of work to still be done, but the progress of the past 27 years has been nothing short of miraculous.

To take India (a country I've lived and worked in) as an example, even the right-wing current Prime Minister has as his chief stated goal to give every Indian access to a toilet. And it's working (he's not there yet, but the progress has been impressive).

There's a lot of work to still be done, but I'm done conceding the recent past. We know what works, and we've been doing it, and we need to stop pretending that this has been a failure.

[ProudLib72]

3. These are the kind of statistics that piss off conservatives

They can't stand that their economic influence is diminished.

[GliderGuider]

4. Source data

http://data.worldbank.org/topic/poverty

[Recursion]

6. Thanks (nt)

[GliderGuider]

7. Whether or not the last three decades have been a failure

depends on what you value.

The growth of population and the decrease in poverty have exacted an enormous price from the planet and its wildlife through such things as global warming, species extinctions, acidifying oceans etc. GW and ocean acidification are direct costs, because money is energy, energy is fossil fuels, and fossil fuels are CO2. Species extinctions are driven by population growth and the encroachment of human activity into the land area previously used as habitat.

Enriching humans impoverishes the planet.