@admitsWrongIfProven @freemo @ABScientist Freemo is correct that, over the long term, things are getting better for everyone:

https://www.gapminder.org/tools/#$chart-type=bubbles

(Be sure to press the "play" button at lower left to see it progress over time. The Gapminder site in general will make one much less cynical about human progress.)

I don't think it's inconsistent with what I cited. It may very well be that at some point in the past 70% of people were in poverty, and of those the majority no longer are, but the poorest still are.

(I believe the elephant curve is per capita, BTW. Also note that it is a percentage increase. If someone making $10 a day and someone making $1000000 a day both double their income, they did not both get the same benefit.)

My mental model is that technology (artificial fertilizers, automation, etc.) has greatly increased humanity's access to resources. The poor have benefited somewhat from this, the rich have benefited hugely, and (because much technology entails resource extraction and pollution) future people will suffer greatly.

I also agree with Freemo's original point that population is a problem. (I don't, of course, agree with the big historical names in the population movement who somehow concluded that poor, brown people are the problem.) I find the IPAT equation compelling:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_%3D_PAT

As to whether the poor have benefited *because* of the wealthy or *despite* them ... we might need a control planet to test that. I certainly see people who are absurdly wealthy while others still struggle, and a demand for perpetual growth manifested in consumerism.

Capitalism in the small -- private businesses producing goods and services, with competition driving them to improve -- is one thing. Runaway, unchecked, predatory capitalism is another.