[ctoll]

There is no meaningful 'best time to be alive' distinct from psychological reality. If people are not adapted to their environment and either don't value it or aren't valued by it, it doesn't matter how much material comfort is available. There is a reason the suicide rate jumps during industrial revolutions.

[nradov]

The suicide rate was never accurately measured before the industrial revolution so we can't make any claims about it one way or another.

[ctoll]

The industrial revolution was not a single event. There is enough data since then to say that economic uncertainty is correlated with suicide and that technological upheaval is correlated with economic uncertainty.

The period we are living through is a time of rapid technological change, whatever you want to call it, and suicide rates have been increasing for the past 25 years. Although I would take any studies and statistics on this with a large grain of salt I think it is not unreasonable to consider these things are related.