A Real Hockey-Stick Graph
posted at 2:05 pm on September 19, 2011 by Karl
From The Economist (via AoSHQ and Dr. Mark J. Perry), a population-weighted history of the past two millennia:
Measured in years lived, the present century, which is only ten years old, is already “longer” than the whole of the 17th century. This century has made an even bigger contribution to economic history. Over 23% of all the goods and services made since 1AD were produced from 2001 to 2010 ***.
For century after century, the human race remained mired in poverty. Life was nasty, brutish and short. Then an incredible explosion of prosperity. How did it happen?
In Civilization: The West and the Rest, Niall Ferguson argues that, beginning around 1500, the West came to dominate the rest of the world because it adopted a system including competition, science, property rights, medicine, the consumer society, and the work ethic. Yet the explosion comes centuries later. In Bourgeois Dignity, Deirdre N. McCloskey argues the explosion was ignited by a new attitude toward wealth and its creation — one that respected innovation and entrepreneurial drive.
In his column on McCloskey’s book, Rich Lowry notes:
Unfortunately, we have a president of the United States who has been a member his entire adult life of what McCloskey — borrowing from Samuel Taylor Coleridge — calls “the clerisy.” These are the intellectualoids who never lost their instinctual scorn for commercial activity. Can you imagine Barack or Michelle Obama routinely urging college students to contribute to hope and change by entering the innovative economy’s great swirl of creative destruction?
Unfortunately, special interests will always pursue anti-innovation trade and regulatory policies to protect their fiefdoms.
Unfortunately, it’s easier to prop up what’s old than foster what’s new. A few years ago, the Federal Reserve handed out billions upon billions of dollars to practically every large, established firm in America.
The problem may be larger than the clerisy’s antipathy to competition. They want to stifle scientific debate when it suits their politics. They have little regard for property rights. They will stifle medical innovation. They indiscriminately bemoan materialism. They never wanted welfare reform and have been busying themselves rolling it back. All of it done in the name of “progress,” of course.
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Capitalism ruined the world because it made it clear to people that some are losers and some are not. Nobody wants to be a loser. We need to go back to the good old days when we were all miserable losers.
NotCoach on September 19, 2011 at 2:13 PM
That “Progress” exemplified by that graph was brought to you capitalism.
El Presidente Downgrade’s ideology is the antithesis of those values, how can the direction they wish to take us in be considered ‘Progress’?
Chip on September 19, 2011 at 2:15 PM
I have a map of the world from 1820 mounted on my wall.
There were only three Republics at the time; Argentina, Venezuela, and the US.
Argentina and Venezuela are labeled as Catholic. The US as Protestant.
Any questions?
tomg51 on September 19, 2011 at 2:15 PM
Obama’s agenda, decoded.
Karl,
I’ve read the article a couple of times, and I have no idea what it means.
BobMbx on September 19, 2011 at 2:16 PM
Lily on September 19, 2011 at 2:16 PM
Actually it was 1517…
Akzed on September 19, 2011 at 2:17 PM
Communism, where Olgioarchs oppressed the masses, is where everyone loses.
ErnstBlofeld on September 19, 2011 at 2:18 PM
Buy Sam a drink and get his dog one too!
reddevil on September 19, 2011 at 2:21 PM
Do you mean Catholicism made what South America is today, while Biblical Fundamentalism made the U.S. of A?
maynila on September 19, 2011 at 2:23 PM
No wonder the left hates Christians. That devious bastard Martin Luther.
NotCoach on September 19, 2011 at 2:25 PM
The explosion that came centuries later was the turning of national economies from those of plunder to those of production. When millions were brought out of slavery and made independently productive people – thats when the explosion happened. Imperialism held back true economic development for hundreds of years.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:26 PM
yes tomg answer that please.
itsspideyman on September 19, 2011 at 2:31 PM
PBHO = Imperialist
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 2:31 PM
Capitalism ruined the world because it made it clear to people that some are losers and some are not. Nobody wants to be a loser. We need to go back to the good old days when we were all miserable losers.
NotCoach on September 19, 2011 at 2:13 PM
We’re gettin’ there.
jaimo on September 19, 2011 at 2:31 PM
No. I think the Republic is the important part. But given the results, it would seem that a second level of additional freedom may have also be important.
I’m no scholar, but this map has always fascinated me. Areas of the world are labelled with Type of Government, Prevailing Religion, Degree of Civilization, and Population.
tomg51 on September 19, 2011 at 2:31 PM
be = been.
As I was saying, I’m no scholar.
tomg51 on September 19, 2011 at 2:33 PM
Absolutely, though thankfully not in the same sense as the English, Spanish, or Dutch. The older imperialism allowed large states to forgo domestic economic development by just plundering gold or commodities from colonial holdings. When they either revolted or dried up, THATS when you see economic output go from linear to exponential growth.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:34 PM
I’m wondering if it was jump-started in 1492… not by Columbus’ voyage but the event that freed up the Spanish crown to finance him, which is the defeat of the Moors at Granada within Andalusia.
teke184 on September 19, 2011 at 2:35 PM
Barack Hussein Obama Jr. was born.
Coincidentally, some 47 years later the air became clearer, the seas receded, automobile gas tanks filled themselves, mortgages became magically paid every month, and we became the ones we have been waiting for.
*wipes away a tear*
Sorry about that emotional outburst, ‘scuse me while I go feed the unicorns.
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 2:35 PM
This, along with the fact that English colonialism fundamentally differed from the Spanish in that it was a resettlement, rather than simply a conquest. The English sent over whole families, while the Spanish just sent slave drivers. Add to that the Catholic v. Protestant differences, and it becomes clear why development in these countries differs so wildly.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:38 PM
Could it not be argued that the policies of the Democratic Party would turn us away from that progress?
Chip on September 19, 2011 at 2:39 PM
Precisely. It is when people starting wanting to read the Bible for themselves that they became literate, and thus the entire intellectual world became accessible to them.
pedestrian on September 19, 2011 at 2:40 PM
Closer examination – Argentina was also identified and Protestant. All three countries are identified a “Enlightened”, the highest Level of Civilization.
This map is part of an atlas that was published in and for the US, particularly for schools.
tomg51 on September 19, 2011 at 2:40 PM
Reformation
Enlightenment
Adam Smith
United States
Oil
Industrial Age
Assembly line
Computers
mankai on September 19, 2011 at 2:41 PM
Like when the Aztecs plundered neighboring peoples and forced upon them a tributary system? Who will cry now for the Totonacans?
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 2:41 PM
Not at all. We are not slaves today, nor were we slaves in the middle 70′s, nor were we slaves in the 1940′s. You see, food stamps are not slavery. Medicaid is not slavery. Public schools are not slavery.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:42 PM
This graph is somewhat deceptive, because economic output and total “years lived” both depend on population, which has exploded since the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century, and even more so since vaccines wiped out “dread diseases” in the mid-20th century (hard to believe, but the Spanish Flu killed more Europeans than World War I).
A more representative graph would plot inflation-adjusted economic output PER CAPITA and life expectancy (= years lived per capita) as a function of century, or even half-century. Such a graph would show a sudden increase in the 19th and 20th centuries, but would not be as exaggerated.
Life expectancy in the West has probably increased by over 30 years since the 1930′s, which is why a retirement program conceived in the 1930′s (Social Security) is unworkable now. Still, I’m not complaining, since based on 1930′s life expectancies I should be dead.
Economic output PER CAPITA probably increased dramatically in the 19th century as well, based on the use of (drum roll…TA DAH!) FOSSIL FUELS, which yield so much more energy than windmills, horses, and oxen. In the 1960′s and 1970′s we found ways to burn them more cleanly, with (real) pollutant emissions decreasing while consumption increased.
But that’s bad for Barry–he needs to ban soda pop gas. No more cars, no more juice, no more (electric) subways. We’ll be like Richard III, trading our kingdom for a horse. Now imagine the streets of New York littered with the poop from 5 million horses year round, complete with flies and mosquitoes and E. coli, washing into the storm sewers with every rainstorm. Gee, what would that do to the life-expectancy curve?
Steve Z on September 19, 2011 at 2:42 PM
If only those dastardly ATMs hadn’t been invented in the 20th century, just imagine how much more prosperous we’d be today.
angryed on September 19, 2011 at 2:44 PM
Ernie you are pretty slow.
BTW is this Obama economy explosive?
CW on September 19, 2011 at 2:46 PM
Thank you Karl…This is wonderful…It is the most under-represented or distorted “fact” in history–that is, capitalism has dragged more people from the bonds of poverty than anything else in history–and its not even close…
RedSoxNation on September 19, 2011 at 2:46 PM
Just a POI (and this is only for the US)… life expectancy in 1940 was about 63, by 2000 it was 77.
mankai on September 19, 2011 at 2:47 PM
Not at all. We are not slaves today, nor were we slaves in the middle 70′s, nor were we slaves in the 1940′s. You see, food stamps are not slavery. Medicaid is not slavery. Public schools are not slavery.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:42 PM
—
So what do you call confiscating the money of one who earned it and giving to those who did not?
CW on September 19, 2011 at 2:47 PM
Sure it is. When the Democrat party gives you everything you need – food stamps, Section 8, Medicaid – you are enslaved. That’s how you end up with families who have been on welfare for generations and will be on welfare for generations to come. They are slaves to the govt.
Sure, they are “free” to leave whenever they want. But realistically speaking they never will. They don’t know how to live without a handout. It would be like putting a domesticated cat into the wilderness. Wouldn’t survive more than a few days.
angryed on September 19, 2011 at 2:47 PM
I’m curious as to just how many people on welfare you actually know, Ed. I mean, my own parents were born into families on welfare, in the south bronx in the late 1950′s. Families get out, people get out. It’s not slavery. Certain families never really get the hang of it, but that’s a far cry from actual enslavement. Your hyperbole is unnecessary.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:50 PM
Actually, capitalism and the left’s disdain for it shows their extreme hypocritical stance on science.
When “survival of the fittest” needs to be shown as a fact of evolution to thwart any religious or moral argument, it is there and ready to be used.
When “survival of the fittest” is used in the exact same manner regarding human survival (capitalism) it’s pooh-pooh’ed. They then want to point to “reason” as being a greater force than the evolution they were touting just a few moments before.
ButterflyDragon on September 19, 2011 at 2:50 PM
Mildred: This food is disgusting.
Jane: Terrible - I can hardly get it down.
Mildred: And the portions are so small!
Tzetzes on September 19, 2011 at 2:51 PM
If that’s what you call slavery, then I suppose we’ve never been free. Not ever.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:52 PM
The progressive wet dream.
98ZJUSMC on September 19, 2011 at 2:53 PM
Questions of public policy have more to do with what is than what ought to be. Yes, families keep rising and falling here in America, and everywhere else, but that doesn’t mean that someone who loses their job and gets diagnosed with cancer ought to just be left to die.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:54 PM
Is that what I said? I asked what you call those programs.
While you are at it do you think those programs are fair to those that are paying in?
You are dumber than you appear.
CW on September 19, 2011 at 2:56 PM
Food stamps, medicaid, public schools and anything that people believe they are entitled to from the government can be a form of enslavement when they accept it as the best the government can give them and that they do not need to work for anything better.
shick on September 19, 2011 at 2:58 PM
Not at all my friend, one can be a slave in one of two ways – when your time and labor is at the default beck and call of the government. A claim that is ever steadily increasing each and ever year.
You can also be a slave in the sense that when you are dependent on the government you have no choice but to support those that will take from others in order to provide you with sustenance.
Those who are taxed are controlled by how much is taken from them, with the implicit threat that bad behavior will result in more taken.
Those who receive largess are controlled by how much they receive from the government – in exchange for their vote.
We may not have total slavery, but in some terms, partial slavery can be just as bad.
Chip on September 19, 2011 at 2:58 PM
I call it insurance. In the event you lose your job, or have twins when you were only expecting one child, there will be funds made available so that you or your family don’t have to live out on the street. That’s not slavery.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 2:59 PM
So we’ve been a partially enslaved nation forever. Why is that such a problem for you now, when it wasn’t so 6 years ago?
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 3:00 PM
In other words, you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 3:00 PM
And private philanthropy used to be the way America worked. I’ll present the same question to you that you presented to an earlier post, but centered around your example.
How many people do you personally know that died due to a lack of medical care because they couldn’t afford it?
ButterflyDragon on September 19, 2011 at 3:01 PM
No one’s forced that acceptance on anyone, though. However, I’m enjoying how easily you will all consider our current situation enslavement. It does a great injustice to the memory of actual slavery. You know, the whips and chains and no property/education for millions kind.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 3:01 PM
So you’re up for some good old fashioned welfare reform, including punishing those who are jobbing the system?
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 3:02 PM
And during the era of private philanthropy, actual racial domination was still going on. Jim Crow was mighty strong. Do you really think the Carnegies and 1st Methodists of the world were providing health care and housing to all those people? Are we really just supposed to hope that the Carnegies and 1st Methodists of today will take care of everyone in need, or do we get to stay in the modern world where the state provides a bare minimum, as per the recommendation of Austrian economists like Hayek?
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 3:04 PM
Absolutely!
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 3:06 PM
Especially, since Colonialism predated that explosion by over 200 years, eh?
Industrial Revolution, Capitalism……….ringing a bell?
*sigh* Public schools…..Heh, public schools are a type of slavery you don’t understand.
98ZJUSMC on September 19, 2011 at 3:06 PM
Flying Pigs, we agree on something.
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 3:07 PM
It doesn’t have to appear as forced. I don’t consider my current situation as enslavement though others are doing all they can to bring that to reality. I consider those in the slums of America to be slaves to the system.
Your understanding of slavery seems to be limited to the last couple of centuries in the U.S..
This definition fits well withing the harsh conditions of most of our inner cities. Generations are being brought up as slaves to the state through subtle means.
shick on September 19, 2011 at 3:08 PM
Ummm how do you know I didn’t have a problem with it 6 years ago?
Our present predicament isn’t all of El Presidente Downgrade’s doing – FDR bequeathed Social Security on us, LBJ gave us his ‘Great Society’ Medicaid debacle [And the idea of bowing out of being re-elected, hint, hint]
But as others have stated, Obama made things worse.
And he keeps on wanting to insanely do it over and over again when it’s been proven to not work.
Chip on September 19, 2011 at 3:08 PM
You have a tangent for everything in the past that drives the point in your mind that the Utopian vision of total subservience to the God of Government is the answer?
Here’s the thing most socialists overlook and refuse to come to grips with. Your Utopian vision requires 100% buy-in and complete compliance by every single member of that society. There is no room for any dissension. Even one dissenting voice can bring it all tumbling down.
So, how does that Utopian vision of the God of Government deal with that? Suppression and from what history has shown us, the murdering of that government’s own citizens.
It’s the stark reality you refuse to accept as part and parcel of your vision on how government “should” work.
In the hopes of saving that one poor sick person on the corner, you’re willing to sacrifice millions of your fellow citizens. You just don’t see the hypocrisy of it all.
ButterflyDragon on September 19, 2011 at 3:13 PM
That issue is closer to home than for most here. My father’s family was very much stuck in the “Great Society” welfare model of “oh, I need a couch, off to the welfare office for $500″. He saw how it kept his brothers and sisters from really exploring their potential, though he luckily go out (thanks to a public higher education). We’ve always been democrats, but I support welfare reform that turns us from LBJ type programs to rigorously means tested, temporary assistance. Sh*t happens, and for that theres food stamps and medicaid. It’s when you guys start telling me that food stamps are slavery that I begin to fight back.
ernesto on September 19, 2011 at 3:13 PM
Lying GOP shill.
The first time around it was an economic stimulus, this time PBHO wants a fiscal upgrade program.
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 3:17 PM
I’m not telling you that, I agree that there should be assistance available to people who find themselves stranded through no fault of their own. But, but I would like to see a set of conditions attached that are rigid and meaningful, and if the recipient knowingly breaks them they suffer the consequences.
Bishop on September 19, 2011 at 3:20 PM
It’s when you refuse to address human nature that conservatives fight back.
You cannot change human nature no matter how hard you may try. There will ALWAYS be someone out to game the system. There will always be someone not putting forth 100% of their effort in supporting themselves as long as they know they can legally milk a system they can use to survive off of.
We have an entire generation of Americans right now that see it as people “owing” them something even though they have never earned a damn thing. People looking for the quick payout on a car accident, unemployment benefits for years, etc.
Why work harder when you can work smarter? And right now the system is so bloated with social programs that people can literally live rather well without having to work a day in their life.
ButterflyDragon on September 19, 2011 at 3:21 PM
Oh please. This is the most pathetic debating technique out there. I don’t know anyone in situation X, therefore I can’t have an opinion.
OK how many billionaires do you know? None? Well then how dare you talk about taxing billionaires when you don’t even know any?
See how stupid that sounds?
angryed on September 19, 2011 at 3:23 PM
Lots of flying pigs in this thread. I agree with your last post, except for your opinion that it’s not (or never) slavery.
I’ve always likened these assistance programs to a bridge spanning troubled waters. It’s the people that choose to live under the bridge instead of just walking over it that become the slaves. And the people that are forced at gun-point to pay into these systems that are over-used are also made slaves by the squatters. I wouldn’t feel enslaved by paying into these programs if they were only used properly, and I think verrrry few people would.
shibumiglass on September 19, 2011 at 3:24 PM
One thing is quite clear from this thread:
The person using the Ernesto Hotair account today is not the person who normally has been using it over the past few months.
CW on September 19, 2011 at 3:28 PM
Prior to the welfare state people knew they were on their own. They had to make preparations for the just in case situation. That meant saving money for their own retirement. That meant living within their means. It means having kids that you can afford to raise. It means actually – HORROR OF HORRORS – paying for your own food and your own shelter.
Today you don’t need that. Saving? Why bother when the govt will be there to take care of me. Medical care? Govt will give it to me. Live within my means? Why, when the govt will be there to bail me out. Have kids I can afford to raise? Why, when the govt will raise my kids for me. And so what if that means I give up my freedom to invest my money as I choose? So what if I give up my freedom to raise my kids as I choose? So what if I have to live where the govt says I need to live? So what if I can only eat what the govt says I can eat? So what if the govt decides what medical procedures I get and what medical procedures are not for me?
A little slavery never hurt anyone, right?
angryed on September 19, 2011 at 3:30 PM
And they make DAMNED SURE that none of their ‘advances’ apply to them.
GarandFan on September 19, 2011 at 3:30 PM
Always interesting when you only address half my post. Pretty telling.
CW on September 19, 2011 at 3:32 PM
Except his idea of reform means the evil rich have to start paying their fair share to take care of all those innocent poor people that were exploited on the way to all those ill-gotten gains.
xblade on September 19, 2011 at 3:37 PM
Oh and you never did tell me if this BHO economy is “explosive”?
CW on September 19, 2011 at 3:38 PM
Dependence is slavery. By your logic, junkies aren’t slaves to their dealers.
Do you want to know the distilled, most accurate meaning of all your beliefs?
Freedom Is Slavery.
War Is Peace.
There’s more, but I forget the rest.
Squiggy on September 19, 2011 at 3:48 PM
Ernie,
I asked you a few times and never got a reply. You said welfare is needed to right the wrongs of racism against the brown man.
So by that logic no white person should receive welfare. Unless you also think whites on welfare are the victims of racism against the brown man too?
angryed on September 19, 2011 at 3:50 PM
I am sure a leech like Ernesto can find many different reasons for welfare.
CW on September 19, 2011 at 3:52 PM
Reformation, created in the image of God.
Speakup on September 19, 2011 at 4:10 PM
Sorry erny. Ever since your fake story about your fake cousin in the police union you have no credibility to have any personal stories about your family taken seriously.
Scrappy on September 19, 2011 at 4:11 PM
Aah, a good memory. Trolls just hate that.
slickwillie2001 on September 19, 2011 at 4:31 PM
I call it 0bamanomics… or by its previous name, socialism.
Wolftech on September 19, 2011 at 5:33 PM
I remember reading some (very good) papers by a Don McCloskey back when I was an econ student about a decade ago. I wondered whether Deirdre McCloskey was a relative, so I checked out Wikipedia. Turns out she’s a closer relative than I expected:
Dude…
Jazzman on September 19, 2011 at 5:39 PM
Things began to change “around 1500″ for not one, but a host of reasons. As others have already mentioned, there was Martin Luther and the Protestant reformation in 1517, but there was also Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press around 1440, and Tyndale’s English translation of the Bible in 1525 (almost two centuries after John Wycliffe’s efforts). The opening of the new world and European colonialism were no small part of the changes “around 1500″ as well. The onset of the decline of the Ottoman empire and emergence of trade and shipping to and from Asia were factors as well.
My collie says:
CyberCipher on September 19, 2011 at 6:13 PM
LAME analysis.
The chart is measured in US Dollars, which have lost 98% of their value since the Federal Reserve was founded in 1913. So what’s the point? It’s like measuring distance when the definition of a meter changes from year to year.
Epic Fail.
shawk on September 19, 2011 at 8:09 PM
Could it be that free market capitalism and the gasoline powered engine have engendered more prosperity and alleviated more human misery than, say, communism or fascism or socialism or Solyndra- Hussein corruptionalism?
Naw…. couldn’t be…
Dhuka on September 19, 2011 at 8:27 PM
What Martin Luther started in 1517, the liberation of the individual and freedom to worship God directly and personally, continued as the concept of individual freedom permeated throughout society. From religion, politics, economics, education, medicine, the individual was liberated to follow a path not determined by birth or social standing. This blossomed in the 20th century (for the Christiana/capitalistic world) where opportunity, fueled by ambition, hard work, and ingenuity, reaped ever-increasing rewards in all areas of life, in virftually every country that embraced individual freedom and liberty. The irony lies with those who benefitted most from this liberation from birth and social restrictions, (such as a President who by birth would have been destined to remain in the lower classes of social standing) are so inclined to promote class welfare and return to the era of restricted social/economic mobility.
jerseyman on September 19, 2011 at 11:27 PM