2022年1月10日
J.Bradford DeLong
Pessimism Amid Progress
Humanity as a whole is wealthier today than at any time in its history. And yet, from the short-term challenge of the pandemic to the existential threat of global warming, there is a widespread sense that things are going badly wrong. The start of a new year is an occasion for hope, but is pessimism the more appropriate default?
To answer that question, we should consider our current situation in a broader context. For the first ten thousand years after the invention of agriculture, humanity had no chance of achieving any approximation of "utopia," regardless of how one defined that term. Then, within our parents' and grandparents' lifetimes, something approaching that ideal came into view. Yet we have repeatedly failed to grasp it. As my friend the late Max Singer used to say, a truly "human world" will remain out of reach until we have figured out the politics of wealth distribution. ...
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