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Human development has improved all over the world: between 1990 and 2015, the number of countries classified as having low human development fell from sixty-two to forty-one, while those classified as having very high human development rose from eleven to fifty-one. At the same time, progress has slowed since 2010.

Africa’s population, now more than one billion, is the world’s fastest growing. It is also the youngest. The region’s population has quadrupled in the last fifty years and is predicted to double again, to two billion, by mid-century. It is steadily becoming more urbanized. Also likely, though, is that this population increase will prove to be more

Malaria is far from the only problem that diminishes with wealth and economic growth. In the United States, one of the world’s richest countries, 993 out of every 1,000 children born survive to the age of 5. In Liberia, one of the world’s poorest countries, only about 765 children survive to age 5 (i.e., 235 of every 1,000 children die before seein

India has seen social as well as economic progress. Life expectancy has more than doubled since independence in 1947. Literacy has more than quadrupled over that same period. In the past fifteen years, India has made remarkable strides in lifting its people out of extreme poverty. But even so, poverty remains widespread, several hundred million Ind