Melbourne Herald Sun, Friday May 6 2011
What would you call me if I told you that you have never been richer, or better clothed and fed, or safer from war and death, than any previous generation?
A fool? A pollyanna? No - it's the truth, and that's official.
In the media, from the morning editions to the nightly bulletins, from the mouths of politicians and commentators, come the cries of doom, death and thievery. But research guru Phil Ruthven of IBISWorld reports differently.
Are the costs of groceries making us poorer? Don't see how - we only spend seven per cent of our income on them. And less than two per cent on utilities, so much for the "soaring costs".
Our average household income has never been higher - ever. Today it's $130,000; in 1901, in today's money, it was $30,000. Even twenty years ago it was only today's equivalent of $100,000.
We live in a service economy. Where others in the world struggle to put food on the table, we spend just 25 per cent on retail - that's food, clothes, fridge and car. And we spend 11 per cent on entertainment and holidays.
Now tell me, whereabouts is the hardship we all whinge about? It's not in the figures so it must be in our heads.
Ah but what about war and struggle and terrorism? Well I don't want to sound cold-hearted here, but the problems are really small beer.
The Human Security Report is a think tank at Vancouver University. They study global conflict, and last year reported that once again wars have dwindled.
Yes there are still lots of internal, civil wars. But no grand conflicts like the First World War which killed 65 million, or the Second which killed 72 million.
I know it's small comfort if you have someone serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, but the Report states that today's conflicts kill 90 per cent less people than in the 1950s, when colonial wars were raging.
Between 1992 and 2008, the number of conflicts dropped by 40 per cent, and those they call "high-intensity conflicts", where more than 1000 deaths occur, fell by 78 per cent.
In other words there are less wars, killing less people, than at any time in world history. But how often do you read about that in the media? Well I'm trying to strike a very out-weighted balance.
Did you know that we are living in what historians call "The Long Peace"?
"It's a change of spectacular proportions," says historian Evan Luard. "Perhaps the single most striking discontinuity that the history of warfare has anywhere produced."
Sorry, but a few louts on Dandenong Station is not the same level of threat as the entire youth of the country being shipped off to the Somme or the Rhine.
At this point let me hand a medal to our business people. They have made the major impact on our wealth and prosperity. Efficiencies in production and the supply chain have pulled down the price of food.
Economies of scale have reduced the prices of manufactured durables. The growth in services - from medicine to communication to finance - have made our lives healthier and more comfortable.
And the very act of trade, the increasing dependence of every nation on every other nation, is our strongest peace weapon. We can't go to war any more - we'd be dropping bombs on our own branch offices.
So to sum up in my most diplomatic words: shaddup and quit your whingeing! Life has never been this good before.
ray@ebeatty.com
