I'm a recent college graduate and a zealous political junkie. Here are the words I live by:

This is my long-run forecast in brief:

The material conditions of life will continue to get better for most people, in most countries, most of the time, indefinitely. Within a century or two, all nations and most of humanity will be at or above today's Western living standards.

I also speculate, however, that many people will continue to think and say that the conditions of life are getting worse.

- Julian Simon Professor of Economics, University of Maryland (1932-98)