The first copies of my book are here!

The result of years of research and writing, 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘪𝘮 𝘖𝘭𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘴 takes the reader on a tour of a thankfully lost world of bloodletting, filth, destitution, and famine-induced cannibalism.

Pre-order now: a.co/d/0hrciEBm

The bad old days were bad! @chellivia

Chopping off corpses’ heads to prevent them from becoming vampires? This was life in the preindustrial past. Cato's @chellivia has a new book, The Grim Old Days, a tour of a world we should be very glad to have left behind.

Order now:
cato.org/books/grim-old…

Very interesting research! Excited to discuss it soon with Justin on the Human Progress Podcast.

An update, for those of you who've heard the episode on tooth-brushing in my series with @vpostrel : A Science article about a piezoelectric toothbrush that "generates reactive oxygen species to disrupt bacterial membranes."

Nice first sentence in the abstract, too. (via a pal)

“For centuries, the last years of life were practically synonymous with poverty.” Today, growing old is more prosperous, on average, than it's ever been. “It's a Golden Age for the Golden Years” — @chellivia

"It’s a Golden Age for the Golden Years." My latest via @NRO.

Give it a read: nationalreview.com/2026/11/its-a-…

Who are "the rich" in America? Most people picture tech billionaires. But there's 3 million private business owners worth at least $5 million across the country, from gutter manufacturers to hot dog restaurant owners. Together they hold 13 times the wealth of the Forbes 400.
and @omzidar join "The Economics of It" to explain how these “Main Street Millionaires” got rich, and what it shows about American capitalism.

Links in replies.

You don’t speak for Mother Nature.

The Earth is 536.4% more abundant today than it was in 1980. humanprogress.org/the-simon-abun…

Factories had harsh conditions. What were workers’ alternatives?

Chelsea Follett argues that judging industrialization requires an honest comparison with the world before it.

LPP 223.

Watch LPP 223, subscribe, and share:
vanceginn.substack.com/p/ab1570b1-694…

There is a common view that medieval people adapted to high child mortality by becoming more emotionally distant from them.

Modern scholarship has demolished this: medieval people loved their children just as much as us, made vast sacrifices for them, and expected little in return.

So the @SevaUT is directionally right here in saying that medieval people went about permanently traumatised. Most people had three or four children, of whom one or two died. This was torment for them.

The shadow of death over English childhood did not lift with the passing of the Middle Ages. My great-grandmother, whom I knew well, was born in 1906, when 15% of children died in their first year, against 25% in the Middle Ages. My grandmother, who is still alive, was the only one of her several siblings to survive her first year. The past is very near.

This is the home my grandmother lived in (Lee County., NC) until she went to college in **1948**. Anyone selling you an early or mid 20th century golden age is full of it.

I love the series based on 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘪𝘮 𝘖𝘭𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘴 in Larry Janesky's @thinkdaily and his insights. "What an opportunity we have. Yet access alone doesn’t make us wiser. We still have to open the book, study the lesson, and put an idea to work."

Give it a read: thinkdaily.com/2026/11/the-gr…

Personalized AI could help workers who might otherwise be excluded. @RBenSperry & @kristianstout examine how AI can offer useful, tailored assistance while protecting users’ privacy: laweconcenter.org/resources/the-…

Listen to Taylor.

Watch Chelsea and I talk about her new book "The Grim Old Days" in Episode 197 of @freethe_economy: youtube.com/watch?v=rXAsA3…

.@TedNordhaus's excellent essay about his uncle, the recently deceased Nobel laureate William Nordhaus: breakthroughjournal.org/p/the-original…

If you missed today’s book forum for 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘪𝘮 𝘖𝘭𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘴, watch the replay:

I recorded a fabulous conversation with @chellivia Chelsea Follett on her new book, which I cannot overstate how important it is to be reminded of just how good life is for us today. A few of the dozens of quotes I highlighted:

"Giving infants alcohol served a double purpose: to and to drug the poor infants into crying less."

"Some historians have argued that the main motivation for married women committing infanticide in the premodern period was the desire to limit family size."

"Females could marry when they reached their twelfth birthday. The age for males was 14....a girl knew that unless she married before she was 21, society would consider her useless, fit only for the nunnery, or, in England, the spinning wheel (a 'spinster')."

"Many households also turned to attempts at magic to defend against thieves and monsters using...amulets, ranging from horse skulls to jugs known as 'witch-bottles'."

"Many of our ancestors did not use latrines of any kind. Urinating in the fireplace, even when lit, was a common practice across social classes...residents dumped their waste each night after 10 o'clock, hurling it out of windows at the sound of a drum, but only after warning passing pedestrians by shouting 'Gardy-loo'."

Baited meat was higher priced that non-baited meat, meaning blood sports like bull and dog fighting "tenderize the meat and, inexplicably, to improve the beef's nutritional quality."

"Public executions were considered a wholesome amusement for all ages, with entire families often gathering for the show."

"In the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the maximum life expectancy at birth was about 40 years, and it fell significantly during times of plague and famine."