4 ms·

I think this is inaccurate and you need citations to justify the idea that those in deep poverty are better off then they were 25, 50, 100 years ago. Health ou

by habnds 7y ago

I think this is inaccurate and you need citations to justify the idea that those in deep poverty are better off then they were 25, 50, 100 years ago. Health outcomes, (obesity, nutrition, drug addiction ) could easily be worse. Security outcomes, (violent crime, domestic violence, police violence) could easily be worse. Economic outcomes (job security, lifetime earning expectations, minimum wage) could easily be worse. Social outcomes ( close friends, community ties, connection to close family memebers) could easily be worse. Remember that looking at averages is misleading if the distribution is changing around a constant mean. Further, the idea that crime is an economic choice, and not a socially determined choice is highly suspect. For instance, street level drug dealers make very little money [1], the average US bank robber steals ~$4,000 [2]. Crime is rarely a "rational decision" it's made in a socially constructed context. [1] https://www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/sp/5049.pdf https://www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/sp/5049.pdf [2] https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/06/11/what-you-should-know-before-robbing-a-bank https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/06/11/what-you-sho...

vorpalhex 7y ago
There is no way that Health and Security outcomes are worse today than maybe 50 years ago. The crime rate has fallen dramatically since the 90s, and health outcomes are dramatically improved between advancement of medical tech and generally improved care. Do we have an obesity problem? Sure, that's kind of a self caused issue. You could blame our food being too cheap, but the alternative is starving to death which is far less in your realm of control. Minimum wage is at its highest in direct value, luxury goods are at their cheapest. Now instead of writing a letter or traveling significant distances, you can chat with your friends all damned day. Is life hard and imperfect? Of course it is, but to suggest that somehow life is harder now than in the past 25 or 50 or 500 years is absolutely foolish.
- habnds 7y ago
  So it should be easy for you to find sources. Life Expectancy in the US is going down [1]. That's happening as many people are living longer than ever. The difference comes from plummeting life expectancies at the bottom. Real minimum wages peaked in the 1980's [2] Calling obesity "self caused" is unreasonable. Access to food, particularly for poor people is very different today than at any time in the past, Malnutrition is totally possible alongside sufficient caloric intake. Why is the cost of "luxury goods" relevant to anything? [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/21/health/us-life-expectancy-study/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/21/health/us-life-expectancy... [2] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-real-value-u-s-minimum-wage/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-real-value-u-s-...
  - vorpalhex 7y ago
    Life expectancy in the US has dropped by about 4 months in the last 3 years. In the last 40 years it has increased over 8 years. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?locations=US https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?location... Remember that real wage is a deflection based on cost, but the cost of living is absolutely localized whereas the minimum wage is federal unless overridden by the state. Therefore as an average that might be true, but is generally incorrect for any given actual datapoint. Just because minimum wage is garbage in Mountain View doesn't mean it's not perfectly fine in Ohio. https://saylordotorg.github.io/text_microeconomics-theory-through-applications/s14-01-nominal-wages-and-real-wages.html https://saylordotorg.github.io/text_microeconomics-theory-th... https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/index/north-america https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/index/north-americ... Obesity is absolutely self caused unless you're on a feeding tube. You can get 2400 cals a day for about $4 from McDonalds - don't even need to cook. Yes, your fresh organic vegetables that had to be trucked in from halfway across the US costs more than a bag of processed corn chips that can sit on a shelf for 2 years. You can still eat very healthy for very little money. The cost of luxury goods is relevant because things like laptop computers, the internet, cellphones, cars, and so on are considered luxury goods. And hey, it turns out it's pretty hard to get a job if you can't email, and it's hard to be connected if you don't have a phone. You can get a functional phone for $20 and a plan for about $15 or less a month - something mind boggling compared to a few decades ago, not to mention more portable than a telegraph or a landline.
    - habnds 7y ago
      Again, you're looking at the average life expectancy, but we're talking about the poor, not everyone. CoL in NYC/SF has almost no effect on the overall price index, it's much more representative of middle america. Completely missed my point about someone being malnourished because they get all of their calories from Mickey D's. You'd be surprised how many poor people continue to have low access to email and find jobs by physically walking into retail stores to apply.
      - vorpalhex 7y ago

by habnds 7y ago

vorpalhex 7y ago

There is no way that Health and Security outcomes are worse today than maybe 50 years ago. The crime rate has fallen dramatically since the 90s, and health outcomes are dramatically improved between advancement of medical tech and generally improved care. Do we have an obesity problem? Sure, that's kind of a self caused issue. You could blame our food being too cheap, but the alternative is starving to death which is far less in your realm of control. Minimum wage is at its highest in direct value, luxury goods are at their cheapest. Now instead of writing a letter or traveling significant distances, you can chat with your friends all damned day. Is life hard and imperfect? Of course it is, but to suggest that somehow life is harder now than in the past 25 or 50 or 500 years is absolutely foolish.

habnds 7y ago
So it should be easy for you to find sources. Life Expectancy in the US is going down [1]. That's happening as many people are living longer than ever. The difference comes from plummeting life expectancies at the bottom. Real minimum wages peaked in the 1980's [2] Calling obesity "self caused" is unreasonable. Access to food, particularly for poor people is very different today than at any time in the past, Malnutrition is totally possible alongside sufficient caloric intake. Why is the cost of "luxury goods" relevant to anything? [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/21/health/us-life-expectancy-study/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/21/health/us-life-expectancy... [2] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-real-value-u-s-minimum-wage/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-real-value-u-s-...
- vorpalhex 7y ago
  Life expectancy in the US has dropped by about 4 months in the last 3 years. In the last 40 years it has increased over 8 years. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?locations=US https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?location... Remember that real wage is a deflection based on cost, but the cost of living is absolutely localized whereas the minimum wage is federal unless overridden by the state. Therefore as an average that might be true, but is generally incorrect for any given actual datapoint. Just because minimum wage is garbage in Mountain View doesn't mean it's not perfectly fine in Ohio. https://saylordotorg.github.io/text_microeconomics-theory-through-applications/s14-01-nominal-wages-and-real-wages.html https://saylordotorg.github.io/text_microeconomics-theory-th... https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/index/north-america https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/index/north-americ... Obesity is absolutely self caused unless you're on a feeding tube. You can get 2400 cals a day for about $4 from McDonalds - don't even need to cook. Yes, your fresh organic vegetables that had to be trucked in from halfway across the US costs more than a bag of processed corn chips that can sit on a shelf for 2 years. You can still eat very healthy for very little money. The cost of luxury goods is relevant because things like laptop computers, the internet, cellphones, cars, and so on are considered luxury goods. And hey, it turns out it's pretty hard to get a job if you can't email, and it's hard to be connected if you don't have a phone. You can get a functional phone for $20 and a plan for about $15 or less a month - something mind boggling compared to a few decades ago, not to mention more portable than a telegraph or a landline.
  - habnds 7y ago
    Again, you're looking at the average life expectancy, but we're talking about the poor, not everyone. CoL in NYC/SF has almost no effect on the overall price index, it's much more representative of middle america. Completely missed my point about someone being malnourished because they get all of their calories from Mickey D's. You'd be surprised how many poor people continue to have low access to email and find jobs by physically walking into retail stores to apply.
    - vorpalhex 7y ago