Factfulness

I disliked this book when I've started reading it, specially due to its condescending tone, but the last chapters have changed my mind.
What is Factfulness about? The world can be bad and getting better at the same time. We tend to have an overdramatic worldview, which may affect our decisions and might get us stressed and worried about the wrong things.
I believe that I tend to avoid most of the dramatic instincts referred in the book. However, I have a very strong negativity instinct which kept me having internal discussions with the author and I'm still not convinced about some of the issues, namely the extreme poverty/ poverty question.

I mostly enjoyed learning about the four levels of income as I had an outdated view of the world and was still splitting it into developed and developing countries.
In this approach, the world is divided in four income level:
- Level 1: People living with less than 2 $/day
- Level 2: People living with 2 - 8 $/say
- Level 3: People living with 8-32 $/day
- Level 4: People living with >32 $/day

Although it is very comforting to know that only 10% of the world population is living in level 1 - Extreme poverty - I have trouble seeing “most people are living on the two middle levels, where people have most of their basic human needs met” as exciting news. Why? Because all 3 levels are below what is considered the US poverty line, which means that 86% of the world population is living under this line.
I do understand that is a huge difference between the 3 levels of income, specially for the people living in level 1, and I do see the evolution of people living on those levels as a positive fact that should be celebrated. My main question is: if the world keeps getting better when is the extreme poverty line going to be reviewed? When there is no more people living in level 1?
As you can see, my negative instinct is prevailing in this subject and I will keep trying to learn more about this.

Another issue for me was the question regarding the critically endangered species. In 1996 tigers, giant pandas and black rhinos were critically endangered and today they are not. This does not mean the world is getting better, this means that awareness and the measures taken to protect these species have worked.
By using this information the author is playing with the data to support his view, as all the bad guys referred in the book do. There is no more information regarding animal conservation on the book and the main purpose was to explain that it is possible to change the course of the events. However, the questionnaire was used to show that the world is a lot better than we might think, and by using the change on the conservation status of theses species the readers might be led to believe the same is happening in other species when it is not truth.
Between 1997 and 2020 the number of threatened species has increased. In the latest version for 2020, more than 15,400 animals were listed as threatened - almost double the number of 2007
(https://www.statista.com/chart/17122/number-of-threatened-species-red-list/).

I'm struggling between the 3 and 4 stars but I do recommend the book.