Graphing Optimism

Call me an incurable optimist, but I tend to see human and economic coniditions as being on a continually upward trend. It can be somewhat difficult to hold this seemingly untenable position especially on days when the stock market tanks or oil shoots above 100 dollars per barrel, but all the same hard data show that in most every arena--the economy, demographics, the aviation sector--things are actually improving all the time. Meet a professor who puts my thoughts not only into words, but molds them into dazzling exhibitions: Dr. Hans Rosling of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. Rosling’s stunning displays provide clear focus to one indisputable fact: demographically speaking, the world is getting much better. On a graph moving through time Rosling places 200 countries on a grid with one axis labeled median income and the other life expectancy and shows how these countries have developed over the course of the past 200 years...all in 4 minutes (see here). I know what you’re thinking, this kind of information overload seems about as intellectually satisfying as putting the history channel on fast forward and watching with glassy eyes, yet Rosling’s exuberance and narration bring to the forefront the important message behind this display: people the world over are living longer and getting richer and the developing world is making progress at a tremendous rate. Placed in a longer-term, macrospective environment an interesting phenomenon is illustrated here. By removing ourselves from our own day to day observations of history we are better able to see the ‘grand’ movements. Now, stop for a moment and put yourself in the place of a person living during the Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1918 or the stock market crash of 1929. From his or her perspective the world had taken a turn for the worse--perhaps a herald of a not-so-great future. Yet, in Rosling’s graph shows that these events are mere blips in the general upward progression.
Where am I going with this? In my previous post on jet fuel prices I pointed out that the trend in passenger and cargo numbers is one of substantial long-term increase, even in the face of rising cost of oil. Much as is the case with the events Rosling discusses, we lose sight of the grand scheme when looking at data for the aviation sector. One or two years in a down cycle and analysts begin predicting the end of aviation and factoring out any innovations or coping mechanisms the industry might present. The aviation industry, however, will surprise us from time to time. Take for instance $4.5 billion in profits that is expected to be posted for 2010 (source). Difficult years will happen in the future, yet aviation always innovates, and more people and products will take to the sky. Things always get better. Do not commit the fallacy of the last data point, but look to the long-term trends for strategic guidance.