What Could Go Right? Things Are Looking Up in Mexico

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Things Are Looking Up in Mexico

To an American politician, an approval rating of 70% is the stuff of fantasies. It’s reality, however, for Mexico’s first female (and Jewish) president, Claudia Sheinbaum, who recently completed her first year in office.

What do Mexicans have to be so happy about?

Sheinbaum has continued her predecessor’s social programs that have lifted more than 13 million people out of poverty since 2018 and brought extreme poverty to a historic low. Much of that was achieved through minimum wage hikes. Sheinbaum upped it once again earlier this year, to slightly more than the equivalent of $15 per day. 

These programs also reduced inequality. By one common measure, Mexico now has the second-lowest inequality levels in the Americas, after Canada. 

But Sheinbaum has broken with the previous administration over crime, granting her security chief significant latitude. The results so far aren’t perfect, but they are something. As The Economist summarized, Sheinbaum is “the first Mexican leader in years to push violent crime in the right direction.” Murder, femicide, and disappearances all appear to be down—data is spotty—while arrests and drug and arms seizures are up.

Graph: The Economist

Sheinbaum has also avoided locking horns with her truculent northern neighbor, increasing coordination with the United States around the policing of drug and arms trafficking. In late September, the two countries launched a beefier approach to “stop the southbound flow of firearms,” much of which ends up in the hands of drug cartels.

Not all is rosy, of course. While Mexico’s modest economic growth has exceeded expectations lately, it trails others in the region. A possible renegotiation of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the successor to NAFTA, looms. Remittances have slowed, likely due to nervousness around President Trump’s deportation policies. Governmental corruption and organized crime is so entrenched that rooting it out will take much longer than the five years Sheinbaum has left in her term. And she must continue to maintain a delicate balance with the Trump administration, which may be eyeing more direct intervention in dealing with the cartels.

Still, Sheinbaum’s high approval ratings match what she has already delivered for Mexico. Through an American lens, perhaps the most impressive notch on her belt is that even the opposition likes her.

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By the Numbers

56%: Decrease in Lithuania’s suicide rate since 2004

69: Number of countries with laws prohibiting corporal punishment of children—Czechia is the latest

29%: Annual growth rate of renewable additions between 2023 and 2025, putting tripling of global capacity by 2030 within reach

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Quick Hits

💊 Twenty-two states have passed laws so that doctors can prescribe medication for opioid use disorder without first obtaining insurer approval. That’s up from two states in 2015.

🚫 Maine voters have decided they want the state to implement a “red flag” law, joining more than 20 other states that allow the temporary removal of firearms from persons deemed a risk to themselves or others.

💻 California is leaning into internet privacy, making it mandatory for browsers to offer users a global option that tells websites not to share or sell their personal information—a change that might be easier for companies to roll out nationally.

🧬 In a small pilot study, scientists were able to alter the gene associated with high cholesterol, raising the possibility that a “one and done” treatment option could exist for people born with hard-to-control cholesterol and those with heart disease. (WSJ $)

🌏 Emissions in China have been flat or falling for 18 months, with emissions declines in the cement, transport, and power industries just offsetting increases elsewhere. China is reshaping the world’s energy outlook as it expands its own renewable energy capacity and exports that technology to the developing world.

📉 Europe may now be the world’s smokiest region, but progress has occurred even there, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report. Tobacco use has declined in the region 14% since 2010. Austria, Denmark, and Sweden have achieved a 30% reduction—the target set by the WHO—and Estonia, Finland, Germany, Greece, and Ireland are on track to do so by the end of the year.

🔬 Africa has opened its first drug regulation agency, raising the possibility that the continent’s genetic diversity will be included in clinical research and that drug developers will be more likely to conduct clinical trials there.

☀️ The Australian government is set to offer three hours of free solar power to millions of households in a pilot program beginning in 2026.

💷 The UK government is rolling out a suite of plans as part of its financial inclusion strategy, including waiving the requirement of a permanent address for homeless people to open a bank account, a scheme to help victims of domestic abuse repair their credit ratings, and more. 

🦷 Scientists have created a gel that repairs and regenerates tooth enamel, which could prevent people from developing cavities. Tooth enamel does not regenerate on its own.

🌲 Brazil has recorded its largest annual drop in emissions in 15 years, largely due to falling deforestation rates. 

👀 What we’re watching: Will President Trump’s Ozempic deal make America slim again? (TFP $)

💡 Editor’s pick: Undeterred Ukrainians are repurposing war debris for construction projects.

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TPN Member Originals

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• Three rules for a lasting happy marriage | The Atlantic ($) | Arthur C. Brooks
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• America’s “buy now, pay later” trap | GZERO | Ian Bremmer
• Progress books for children | The Roots of Progress | Jason Crawford
• The real “feminization” problem | Of Boys and Men | Richard V. Reeves