| On the environmental front, air, and water quality have been improving for decades. Urban waterways that had been left for dead - Puget Sound, Chesapeake Bay, Boston Harbor, Lake Erie, and many others - have been recolonized by birds, fish, marine mammals, and intrepid swimmers. U.S. carbon emissions have also been falling for years, despite prodigious economic growth. A few cities have reported a recent spike in violent crime. But on the national level, it has been declining for decades. Incomes stagnated during the Great Recession and its aftermath. But wages and household net wealth - thanks to a tight job market and appreciating asset prices - are at record highs again. Many Americans believe that poverty is increasing when they hear that the U.S. middle class is shrinking. Not so. The middle class is shrinking because Americans are moving up. More households than ever are earning over $100,000 a year. Since we live in a knowledge-based society, those with advanced degrees and specialized skills have been getting wealthy faster than the rest of us. But every quintile is rising. American incomes - in inflation-adjusted terms - have more than tripled in my lifetime. The idea that our economic system is based on selfishness, greed and exploitation is a laughable mischaracterization. Yes, Americans are motivated by rational self-interest, as people are everywhere. But you don't get rich by thinking about what you want. You get rich by thinking about what other people want - and how you can make it better, cheaper, or longer-lasting. The beauty of capitalism is you can have whatever you want if you provide enough other people with what they want. No one has ever explained to me how that's a bad thing. Businesspeople are greedy? That may be true in some cases, but here's a reality check... You can be the greediest person on Earth and no one is going to give you a dime unless you provide them with a product, service, or labor that they're willing to pay for. Free-market transactions are voluntary. If you don't want to work for a company, buy from a company, sell to a company, or own its shares, you don't have to. Where is the exploitation in this? In short, the narrative put out by the mainstream media, academia and Hollywood is - to put it bluntly - bunk. No wonder polls show that Americans have less trust in the media than ever. More to the point, why would anyone risk their hard-earned money in the stock market if we lived in a horrible nation at a terrible time and the world is going to hell in a handbasket? We don't... and it isn't. Yes, there are plenty of people in this world who are suffering terribly. Just ask the citizens of Ukraine, Syria, or Venezuela. But things are getting better for most people in most places in most ways. Once you realize how the media distorts and sensationalizes the news - because negativity attracts eyes, ears, clicks, likes, shares, and retweets - you're in on the game. That means you can profit from it. Here's what I mean... We live in a world where people compete for scarce resources: money, power, prestige, you name it. But obtaining these things requires something essential: accurate information. If you listen to news that is sensationalized, biased, overly negative or out of context, it leads to bad decision making. Good information, on the other hand, leads to better decisions. And better outcomes. That's why it's crucial to limit your consumption of cable news, social media blather, and partisan propaganda. It may seem that everyone else is wallowing in this stuff, which is bad for public discourse - and for truth generally. But avoiding it - or sharply limiting it - will help you see the world as it really is and succeed as an investor. (If you want to upgrade your information sources, you might start by visiting websites like Our World in Data or Human Progress.) Don't get me wrong. Problems and setbacks are real and continuous. They have always been with us - and they always will be. But they also contain the seeds of opportunity. And in my next column, we'll discuss how to find the best of them. Good investing, Alex Have you heard about my Emergency State-of-the-Market Summit - happening this Wednesday at 7 p.m. ET? RSVP Here (and find all the important details) (Clicking the link above automatically registers you for Alexander Green's Emergency State-of-the-Market Summit, a free subscription to our e-letter Liberty Through Wealth, and offers from us and our affiliates that we think might interest you. You can unsubscribe at any time. Privacy Policy.) | 
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