EDITORIAL: The world gets richer

Polls show that many Americans today — particularly younger ones — have a less-than-favorable view of free-market capitalism. A recent Gallup survey found that just 54 percent of respondents had a positive opinion of the economic system. Yet many of capitalism’s most vocal critics openly ignore the abundant evidence of its success. The Food and Agriculture Organization this month released its annual report on world hunger. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2026 reports continued progress in attacking malnutrition across the globe. The analysis reports that, in 2025, 7.8 percent of the world’s people were undernourished. That’s down from 35 percent in 1970, an astonishing drop over the decades. In the United States, Canada, Europe and east Asia, the percentage of underno