You are right, the picture is not that great.

I watched a TED talk on YouTube a few months ago about the very same subject. It was quite interesting, they did a survey and asked people their opinion on comparing the status of this or that say 30 years ago and now. On pretty much every subject (powerty, health, education...) the surveys showed consistently that people always thought things got worse. But the objective figures showed the exact opposite. It just goes to show that perceptions can be deceptive.