"The good old days" is a worn trope, but there may be a point. Women's employment and/or compensation in the United States peaked approximately two decades ago

"The good old days" is a worn trope, but there may be a point. Women's employment and/or compensation in the United States peaked approximately two decades ago, and has since declined. Xi Jingping wasn't China's dictator yet, so China was a bit more free. Crimea hadn't been annexed yet, and Russians had much more access to the internet. The alt-right was still in its infancy. Brexit hadn't happened yet. Hence, when a British think tank claims freedom is falling across the world, I'm inclined to believe it. And levels of authoritarianism are inversely correlated with trust. On the flipside, a whole generation of people across many of the poorest parts of the world have experienced increases of standards of living due to globalization.