China's Leap in Reducing Extreme Poverty

Fantastic news. From the World Bank's recent report on extreme poverty (WSJ):

About 1.2 billion people in the world lived in extreme poverty in 2010, subsisting on less than $1.25 a day. That’s down from 1.9 billion three decades ago despite a nearly 60% increase in the developing world’s population.

The total number of people living in extreme poverty has dropped in every developing region over the past three decades. About 21% of the developing world lived on less than $1.25 a day in 2010. In 1981 it was 52%.

The sharpest decline came in China, where the extreme poverty rate fell to 12% in 2010 from 84% in 1981. India’s extreme poverty dropped to 33% of the population from 60% three decades ago.