It's Better Than It Looks: Reasons for Optimism in an Age of Fear - Hardcover

Gregg Easterbrook is the author of ten books, two of them New York Times Notable Books. He was a national correspondent for the Atlantic, and since then has been a contributing editor. He is a former visiting fellow of the Brookings Institution (dual fellowship in economics and in governance studies) and a distinguished fellow of the Fulbright Foundation. He often writes for the Atlantic (nine cover stories), New Republic (seventeen cover stories), and New York Times (thirty-three op-ed pieces and counting). He has been a politics columnist for Reuters and a sports columnist for ESPN. He has written for the New Yorker, Science, Wall Street Journal, Wired, Esquire, Washington Monthly, and Los Angeles Times.

"Besides providing new ammunition for optimists, Mr. Easterbrook's aim in this important book is to identify what we've been doing right and to consider what we can do about the still pressing problems we face... Mr. Easterbrook wants to make optimism intellectually respectable again, and he has done so with cogent arguments and bountiful evidence."―Michael Shermer, Wall Street Journal

"'It's Better Than It Looks' makes many good arguments about inequality...Easterbrook is good on democracy and dictatorship (democracy is better at money and better at war). He is also good on climate change (the technical solutions are there, and all will be fine 'if society chooses reform,' though that choice is surely the crux of the problem)."―Angus Deaton, New York Times Book Review

"Easterbrook sets out to disabuse readers of any casual pessimism and equip them with enough facts and arguments to silence dinner parties from now till kingdom come... rich in detail and observation."―Philip Delves Broughton, Weekly Standard

"Countering the usual pessimism disseminated by the 'experts' and rebroadcast by the 'if it bleeds, it leads' media, 'It's Better Than It Looks' ably defends the view that the grand sweep of history has gone from generally bad to generally good for the vast majority of the world's populace. Whether the book surveys global food supply, infectious diseases, the natural system, the economy, violence, technology or governance, the overall outlook consistently comes up positive, according to Mr. Easterbrook. His impressive, rather objective, amply-referenced, perspicacious analysis supports his optimism."―Anthony Sadar, Washington Times

"Terrific...Easterbrook's core conclusions are compelling, and he writes with a journalist's flair."―Foreign Affairs

"An argument worth considering."―Kirkus Reviews

"America, like most of the world, has fallen prey to a false and destructive narrative: the belief that everything is getting worse. In this important and compelling book, Gregg Easterbrook sets the record straight. His refreshing analysis can restore our optimism and help heal our poisoned politics."―Walter Isaacson, bestselling author of Leonardo da Vinci

"It's Better Than It Looks is a welcome corrective to our fashionable pessimism that things are bad and getting worse, by providing a wealth of evidence that the reverse is true. Gregg Easterbrook is clear-eyed nonetheless in facing up to present challenges, and reminds us that there is always a way forward out of seemingly unsolvable problems."―Francis Fukuyama, Stanford University

"Gregg Easterbrook regrets to inform you that the future is a lot rosier than you've heard. Not only are things Not So Terrible, they are actually Quite Good-and Getting Better. The world's citizens are living longer, economies are expanding, and we produce more food than we can eat. He even suggests that our most intractable problems, like economic equality and climate change, can be ameliorated in our lifetimes. It's Better Than It Looks is anything but Panglossian. It serves up persuasive arguments mustered by a trenchant, erudite and consummately un-boring writer. Start reading - you'll become a believer, too."―Alex Beam, Boston Globe columnist

"I highly recommend that every college and university president purchase enough copies of It's Better Than It Looks to give to every one of their students...Understanding how the world has improved, and will improve in their lifetimes, may be amongst the most important things that we can teach them. It's Better Than It Looks is a good place to start."―Joshua Kim, Inside Higher Ed