The Progress Paradox
How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse
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Narrated by:
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Jonathan Marosz
About this listen
In The Progress Paradox, Gregg Easterbrook draws upon three decades of wide-ranging research and thinking to make the persuasive assertion that almost all aspects of Western life have vastly improved in the past century; and yet today, most men and women feel less happy than in previous generations. Why this is so and what we should do about it is the subject of this book.
Between contemporary emphasis on grievances and the fears engendered by 9/11, today it is common to hear it said that life has started downhill, or that our parents had it better. But objectively, almost everyone in today's United States or European Union lives better than his or her parents did.
Still, studies show that the percentage of the population that is happy has not increased in fifty years, while depression and stress have become ever more prevalent. The Progress Paradox explores why ever-higher living standards don't seem to make us any happier. Detailing the emerging science of "positive psychology," which seeks to understand what causes a person's sense of well-being, Easterbrook offers an alternative to our culture of crisis and complaint. He makes a compelling case that optimism, gratitude and acts of forgiveness not only make modern life more fulfilling but are actually in our self-interest.
Seemingly insoluble problems of the past, such as crime in New York City and smog in Los Angeles, have proved more tractable than they were thought to be. Likewise, today's "impossible" problems, such as global warming and Islamic terrorism, can be tackled, too.
Like The Tipping Point, this book offers an affirming and constructive way of seeing the world anew. The Progress Paradox will change the way you think about your place in the world, and about our collective ability to make it better.
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Let's talk truth!
- By Jeff on 09-02-12
By: Arthur C. Brooks
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The 9.9 Percent
- The New Aristocracy That Is Entrenching Inequality and Warping Our Culture
- By: Matthew Stewart
- Narrated by: Sean Patrick Hopkins
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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In 21st century America, the top 0.1 percent of the wealth distribution have walked away with the big prizes even while the bottom 90 percent have lost ground. What’s left of the American Dream has taken refuge in the 9.9 percent that lies just below the tip of extreme wealth. Collectively, the members of this group control more than half of the wealth in the country - and they are doing whatever it takes to hang on to their piece of the action in an increasingly unjust system.
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Fantastic
- By Davena on 01-05-23
By: Matthew Stewart
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Coming Apart
- The State of White America, 1960–2010
- By: Charles Murray
- Narrated by: Traber Burns
- Length: 12 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way of driving home the fact that the trends he describes do not break along lines of race or ethnicity.
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Brilliant & Flawed
- By Douglas C. Bates on 05-15-12
By: Charles Murray
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Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism
- By: Anne Case, Angus Deaton
- Narrated by: Kate Harper
- Length: 11 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Life expectancy in the United States has recently fallen for three years in a row - a reversal not seen since 1918 or in any other wealthy nation in modern times. In the past two decades, deaths of despair from suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism have risen dramatically, and now claim hundreds of thousands of American lives each year - and they're still rising. Case and Deaton, known for first sounding the alarm about deaths of despair, explain the overwhelming surge in these deaths and shed light on the social and economic forces that are making life harder for the working class.
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So many words, so little insight
- By Trebla on 03-22-20
By: Anne Case, and others
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Arguing with Idiots
- How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government
- By: Glenn Beck
- Narrated by: Glenn Beck, Pat Gray, Steve "Stu" Burguiere
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Idiots can't be identified through voting records, they can be found only by looking for people who hide behind stereotypes, embrace partisanship, and believe that bumper-sticker slogans are a substitute for common sense. If you know someone who fits the bill, then Arguing with Idiots will help you silence them once and for all with the ultimate weapon: the truth.
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Great Book
- By Stacy on 09-22-09
By: Glenn Beck
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This Noble Land
- My Vision For America
- By: James A. Michener
- Narrated by: Arthur Addison
- Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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This Noble Land is Michener's most personal statement about America, an examination of the issues that threaten to fragment and undermine the nation - racial conflict, the widening gulf between rich and poor, the decline of education, the inadequacies of our health care system - as well as a thought-provoking prescription for sustaining our "outstanding success". First published shortly before Michener's death, This Noble Land stands as a wake-up call for a troubled era, infused with the wisdom and passion of a lifetime.
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A startling realization
- By Amazon Customer on 08-15-15
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How Much is Enough?
- Money and the Good Life
- By: Edward Skidelsky
- Narrated by: Clay Teunis
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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What constitutes the good life? What is the true value of money? Why do we work such long hours merely to acquire greater wealth? These are some of the questions that many asked themselves when the financial system crashed in 2008. This book tackles such questions head-on.The authors begin with the great economist John Maynard Keynes. In 1930 Keynes predicted that, within a century, per capita income would steadily rise, people’s basic needs would be met, and no one would have to work more than fifteen hours a week.
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Not what I expected at all!
- By Chi on 05-22-23
By: Edward Skidelsky
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Upside
- Profiting from the Profound Demographic Shifts Ahead
- By: Kenneth W. Gronbach, M.J. Moye, John Zogby - foreword
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Demographics not only define who we are, where we live, and how our numbers change. For those who can read beyond the raw figures, they open up hidden business opportunities that lie ahead. What will happen when retiring Boomers free up jobs? How will Generation Y alter supermarkets? Which states will have the most dynamic workforces? Will American manufacturing rebound as Asia's population declines? Upside puts this powerful yet little-understood science to work finding answers.
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Needs rework to become an audio-book
- By Kristofer Jarl on 11-18-20
By: Kenneth W. Gronbach, and others
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Success and Luck
- Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy
- By: Robert H. Frank
- Narrated by: Robert H. Frank
- Length: 5 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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How important is luck in economic success? No question more reliably divides conservatives from liberals. As conservatives correctly observe, people who amass great fortunes are almost always talented and hardworking. But liberals are also correct to note that countless others have those same qualities yet never earn much. In recent years, social scientists have discovered that chance plays a much larger role in important life outcomes than most people imagine.
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Not what is advertised
- By Andre on 04-18-17
By: Robert H. Frank
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Arguing with Socialists
- By: Glenn Beck
- Narrated by: Glenn Beck, Jeremy Lowell
- Length: 11 hrs and 24 mins
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In Arguing with Socialists, New York Times best-selling author Glenn Beck arms listeners to the teeth with information necessary to debunk the socialist arguments that have once again become popular, and proves that the free market is the only way to go. With his trademark humor, Beck lampoons the resurgence of this bankrupt leftist philosophy with thousands of stories, facts, and arguments for anyone who is willing to ask the hard questions.
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Its great...whatever
- By Jon on 04-08-20
By: Glenn Beck
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Eurotrash
- Why America Must Reject the Failed Ideas of a Dying Continent
- By: David Harsanyi
- Narrated by: Charles Constant
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Europe has been declining under the weight of its antiquated institutions, economic fatigue, moral anemia, and cultural surrender. Yet American politicians, technocrats, academics, and pundits argue, with increasing popularity, that Americans should look across the Atlantic for solutions to the nation’s problems, including on issues like health care, the welfare state, immigration, and a bloated bureaucracy.
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Details on many ways Europe is lacking
- By Alicia B. on 11-15-21
By: David Harsanyi
What listeners say about The Progress Paradox
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Jeff
- 02-02-04
Pretty Good . . . but.
I rather enjoyed this book. However, as someone that is pretty happy, grateful for the things I have and more concerned with environmental issues then the average person . . . I would have to say that I'm in the minority. Having just spent a year traveling around the 'western world' and now returned to my small home town in Canada; I would have to say that what the author has to say relates to most of the people that I met during my travels . . . it's certainly worth listening to (regardless which side of the coin your on.)
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Eric
- 10-11-04
Don't let the extremists stop you.
Quite apart from the Fox News-poisoned minds of some reviewers above, I found this book to be generally quite important, with a few minor exceptions.
Easterbrook is no ranting liberal. He's a middling to conservative catholic writer with a fine head for synthesis. He brings together such wide-ranging topics as affective forecasting, behavioral economics, psychology, religion, sprituality, and statistics into a well-reasoned (but not perfect or comprehensive - no one would read such a book) sensible argument that boils down to this: we can be satisfied only if we choose to be.
The bottomless appetite we all experienced as children can be carried into adulthood if we are not mindful, resulting in a surprising inability to experience happiness in the face of plenty. Our lives can waste away in a cloud of pointless and insatiable material desires.
Great stuff. It will inspire gratitude in all but the most ideological stuf grabbers.
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18 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Michael
- 03-28-07
An Important Listen
I have to say that the first half of the book was very interesting and something I would urge anyone living in western society to listen to. He shows how even though most media outlets like to focus on the negative, and people love to believe everything bad that they hear, things really are getting better from our parents generation.
As someone who lives under 'wage stress' or whatever his name was for people who were just above minimum wage, but also in constant fear of some accidental drain on resources to put them in the poor house, I have to disagree with many of the things he states in the latter portion of his book, which contains almost all of the material I didn't feel fit the theme of the book.
In the first half, he addresses facts about how life is getting better, and wonders why we aren't feeling good about it. You would then say that he would put forth some ideas on how to feel good about it, or at least continue with his 'quit your bitching, things ARE good' feel he had going at the beginning of the book.
Instead, he dives off into long tirades on seemingly unconnected subjects like the 'pathetic arab nations' (his words not mine) and raising the federal minimum wage to an outrageous ten dollars an hour in an effort to make things more expensive for your average American in order to help the statistically fewer poor, forgetting about those of us right above the minimum he suggests, and thusly those that would hurt the worst by the inflation of goods to follow. He also tried to shame the reader into taking on even more of a burden in order to give more money to third world countries. What that has to do with things being better and us not being happy about it is above my head.
Additionally, he seems incapable of using the word "car," instead referring to them as "massive SUV's with the drivers screaming into their cell phones!" While I agree with his general dislike for the vehicle, it isn't the only thing on the road.
Now I'm out of words
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5 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Alexander
- 10-12-10
One of my favorite books
The book weaves a clever argument for prolific discrepancies between the progress made by our society and our psychological perception of it.
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Overall
- glennn
- 04-25-11
Half great read, half political rant
I rated this 3 stars---the first half was easily 5 stars, a well-researched and written analysis of happiness and what does/does not make it. Part 2 was worth 1 star, a seemingly endless retelling of all the woes of current American society and choices. Ironically some of the prescriptions do not even appear to make economic sense. While I do agree with some of the author's points, if I wanted a political discourse on economics I would have bought another book. Will listen to part 1 again; will delete part 2.
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Overall
- Mike Kircher
- 03-14-04
Strong arguments for optimism
Easterbrook has many compelling arguments that although the culture of complaint and pessimism are seductive, an optimistic and kind demeanor towards life and others is far wiser. He cites voluminous statistics concerning how things are improving and studies that demonstrate the benefits to those who follow a philosophy of optimism and compassion.
I have familiarity with some of the literature Easterbrook cites and as a whole his arguments and logic are stronger than those of the individual authors he discusses. After listening to the book, it is more difficult for me to think and act in a pessimistic fashion. This alone makes the book worthwhile
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9 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Brett
- 03-21-04
Challenged my way of thinking
This was a very interesting book. I'm kind of anti-news media, since they always seem to leave you with the impression that the world is a terrible place and that everything is getting worse. This book is filled with facts that make you realize that most things are much better than they have been at any previous time in world history. It was refreshing in that regard.
However, in the middle of the book he launches a tirade against SUV's and how wasteful and horrible they are. I was thinking, huh? Where did that come from? Most cars are more economical these days, why is he focusing on the exceptions now? It was just the beginning... He goes on to plug universal healthcare, ending poverty, class envy, and protecting the environment. All classic liberal causes. I could spend time picking apart the biased way he uses statistics to make some of his points, but I'll leave that to you.
It dawned on me that he was using our unprecedented prosperity to shame people into solving these problems. At the same time I was objecting to where he was going, I was also asking myself, is he wrong? Well, no, these problems need solving (ignoring the hysteria around the causes). The dangerous aspect of the book is that it does not address what method should be used to solve these problems. Many people will look to government to solve the issues, which I think the dangerous aspect of this book. He makes clear points for market economics and interfering with these principles would be detrimental. In my philosophy, charity is a principle of the heart, not a government program.
Overall this is a good read and will challenge both conservatives and liberals alike, not to mention those "glass half empty" folks.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Carl
- 02-04-12
Must read. An intelligent and well researched book
If you could sum up The Progress Paradox in three words, what would they be?
Informed, positive, inspiring.
Who was your favorite character and why?
This is a book about life. Allowed me to look deeper into myself as an individual as well as a member of society, helping me understand how I think, behave and relate to others.
Have you listened to any of Jonathan Marosz’s other performances before? How does this one compare?
No, I have not.
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
This is an amazing book, enriched with words of wisdom throughout. The arguments are very well thought through and the language so straight forward that it can reach any audience.
Any additional comments?
I thoroughly recommend it. It is one of those books that you will come back to a few times, as there is a lot to absorb and to relate to.
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Overall
- J
- 10-30-04
The Good News...that isn't reported.
Easterbrook's book is a good examination, albeit somewhat long-winded, of how the human condition has improved over the past 100 years--and how rarely it is reported.
As an engineer, a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, I found that this book was even-handed, with swipes at the New York Times, The Washington Post, the (non-charitable) religous right and the environmental-nut left.
One of his greatest strengths in the book is his constant willingness to adjust statistics in meaningful ways. For example, while examining the gap between the rich and poor in the United States, he adjusts for first generation immigrants, and discovers that the gap is probably not the concern that it is portrayed. He also points out that the difference between what is available to the very rich and the middle class has drastically shrunk over the past several generations, to the point that it is difficult to identify many things that are only available to the super-rich. His encouragement of charity in general and religion in particular is also good, for he shows a clear understanding of enlightened self-interest.
His greatest weaknesses, however, are in failing to clearly communicate his (presumable) understanding that you can't make people not be poor by giving them money. He underestimates the extent that poor governments cause famine and injustice in the developing world.
Additionally, while his statistical analysis and adjustment is generally good, missing is some of the negative adjustment of expectations. For example, while the number of people attending college and graduating has reached a record high, the number of remedial college courses have also increased.
All things considered, his perspective is a refreshing look at the current human condition, and a good read.
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9 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Guy Comeau
- 11-22-07
Good Listen!
This a great book, it certainly makes you think about the way we live our lives in North America. I've listened to twice. I recommend this to anyone who searches for happiness. It certainly offers some tips and ways to look at life that will make you appreciate what you've got.
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3 people found this helpful