Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883

Guest Editorial: Anecdotes, aberrations and averages

Context matters. Take this simple statement: Nearly 10 percent of the world’s people live in extreme poverty.

This is true. And standing alone, without context, this statement would lead many to think the world has a huge poverty problem. They'd be right. But they'd also be missing a big part of the story: Just twenty-five years ago nearly 30 percent of people lived in extreme poverty.

So th...