All of these "reasons for optimism" trends in the US (and, to a big extent, Europe as well) are to be ignored, since the US is simply moving production of everything outside the country on an unprecedented scale. Every farm that gets released in the mid-west is likely made up by another swath of Amazon rain-forest burned down in Brazil . Even in internal production, every increase in productivity is met with an increase in the push to get people to consume more, so there are no real gains to be had in the current system.