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Life expectancy in the U.S. varies greatly by region
- zoklet-enjoyer 4y agoPretty messed up you can see where the reservations are. Scroll down and compare the maps https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_reservation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_reservation
- dfxm12 4y agoI saw all the doom and gloom tweets, but didn't realize most of the cause boils down to policy decisions. Call your elected officials and tell them you don't want to die an avoidable early death.
- epgui 4y agoI mean, what else could be the cause? One way or another, it'll come down to some insane policy decision or other. And this "states vs federal" power struggle in America (not my country) basically guarantees that there will be variance across states. The division of powers made sense in the old days, but in today's day and age it's crazy that there are not more standards set across the board at the federal level. It's not my battle to fight, but it is depressing to see America squander so many opportunities to make things better.
- Rebelgecko 4y agoEven though there's definitely a strong state by state correlation, I thought it was interesting that a number of states (like South Dakota and Wyoming) had such a wide range of outcomes. Not sure of that's just randomness due to smaller population sizes or what
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- zoklet-enjoyer 4y agoThose are reservations. MT, ND, MN, WI too https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_reservation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_reservation
- Rebelgecko 4y agoWell, that's a very depressing answer to the mystery. Thanks though!
- red-iron-pine 4y agoSmaller populations, more rural populations -- see also: rural vs urban divide -- and, as another poster mentioned, Native American reservations, which are often some of the poorest areas in the US.
- ip26 4y agoThe problem with federal standards is getting everyone to agree. If state standards aren’t allowed and California wants tougher environmental standards on California land, but Texas doesn’t, you force a showdown, a loser, and simmering resentment for decades.
- epgui 3y ago100% agree with the first sentence. > If state standards aren’t allowed and California wants tougher environmental standards on California land, but Texas doesn’t, you force a showdown, a loser, and simmering resentment for decades. Federal standards are in the interest of all citizens, whether or not they frustrate some state politician or not shouldn't even count as an objection. I don't care if the Texas government is happy, but I do care if the people in Texas are healthy. Maybe that's just me though.
- ip26 3y agoFirst, I’m sure it’s hard to imagine, but California could lose said showdown and find themselves obstructed from protecting even only California. Second, it’s not just some lone politician that would care. The whole Roe v. Wade thing should have made clear that half of the country had been seething to overturn it for decades. Our whole system is built on consent of the governed; Federal mandate is therefore tricky if one large state is in overwhelming support of an issue while another is overwhelmingly opposed.
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- pfannkuchen 4y agoWhat changed between the old days and now to make running many independent(ish) experiments in government stop making sense?
- lapcat 4y agoThe 13 colonies were not "experiments". They were preexisting local governments that needed to come to agreement on forming a new nation after overthrowing the rule of the British King. The compromises made in the US Constitution were the price for that agreement at the time. The problem is that people in the 21st century still feel bound by an 18th century agreement. I guess the alternative is another civil war, so that might be why the agreement lasts, no matter how shaky and dubious.
- brightball 4y agoMany US states are size equivalent to entire EU countries. There’s no need to let the EU control those countries directly, same goes for states. Going one level higher up the chain doesn’t gain anything other than further separating people from policy makers.
- lapcat 4y agoHowever, US states are vastly more interconnected than EU countries. We all (well, mostly) speak the same language, we all use the same currency and always have used the same currency, you can walk or drive across the borders of any states with nobody checking or caring, and indeed states don't need to take individual responsibility for protecting their borders militarily. You can live and work in any state you want and move to or work in a different state at any time. The US military is mostly nationalized. The state-based National Guard does exist, but it's quite small and weak compared to the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. And the National Guard doesn't have nuclear weapons! Imagine if individual US states controlled nukes...
- 23B1 4y agoSure seems to me like any time the technocrat/commentariat/coastal crowd point out the various problems with the American South, it's always with this patronizing schadenfreude vibe. "Haha guys look at the poor dumb hicks who don't know what's best for them"
- hotpotamus 4y agoI had a co-worker whose neighbor died recently not all that much after his 40th birthday from some combination of smoking, occupational exposure to construction debris/chemicals, and long covid. He was on the list for a lung transplant for a bit, but no one seemed to believe that gave him any chance, and it did not. Perhaps if he had not smoked, worn proper PPE when needed, and gotten a covid vaccine, he would be alive today. It seems that his downwardly mobile southern culture failed him quite completely, but I do agree that if you had told him that, you'd probably be thought of as a patronizing.
- lapcat 4y ago> Call your elected officials and tell them you don't want to die an avoidable early death. I'm pretty sure they know that already.
- themitigating 4y agoExactly, I'll tell them I want restrictions on guns, more speed limit enforcement, universal healthcar....oh you were trying to be sarcastic
- wesleywt 4y agoI don't think you have noticed. But politics has devolved into being anti-woke rather than making adult policy decisions.
- brightball 4y ago“Every man dies. Not every man truly experiences sweet tea.” - Southern Braveheart (probably)
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- kylehotchkiss 4y ago1 generous cup of sugar per half gallon of tea was my old recipe. I was merely a Virginian so I think it could be increased even more a state or two south
- brightball 4y agoAs a South Carolinian, that recipes is accurate.
- nine_zeros 4y agoOne thing that was stark and unbelievable to me is that the sheer number of medical providers in New England, Western and Upper midwestern states are so much higher than the south. If one were to live in rural America, rural coasts are so much better than rural south, from a medical perspective.
- scottLobster 4y agoWow. I knew of course that there was a spread to the average, but I never imagined there were such large swaths of the country that never even make it to full retirement age.
- ModernMech 4y agoRemember this when they say they want to raise the retirement age.
- seanmcdirmid 4y agoIs it reasonable to raise the retirement age in California (where people live longer) and lower it in Texas where they don’t live quite such a long life? It feels off, I think, people will then move to Texas because they can retire earlier.
- twosdai 4y agoMy guess would be no. Since social security is federally accessible, so I could easily see people just move to Texas a few years earlier from California to get around the age difference.
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- trynumber9 4y agoCorrelation with obesity rate seems stronger than anything else. And alcoholism in certain counties.
- dv_dt 4y agoIt also looks like it correlates to state or local tax rate. But as the old chestnut goes, correlation isn't causation.
- ip26 4y agoBesides, which came first, the chicken or the chestnut?
- UncleOxidant 4y agoSeems to be a lot of correlation to voting patterns as well.
- newfriend 4y ago> Seems to be a lot of correlation to voting patterns as well. No it doesn't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2020_United_States_presidential_election_results_map_by_county.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2020_United_States_presid... It appears to be much more strongly correlated with poverty rate: https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2018/comm/acs-5yr-poverty-all-counties/_jcr_content/root/responsivegrid/embeddableimage1245.coreimg.jpeg/1543960755268/acs-5yr-poverty-rate-all-counties.jpeg https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2018/comm/acs-...
- sremani 4y agoRio Grande Valley (one of poor regions in US) has similar life expectancy as Northern Burbs of DFW while beating Dallas and Tarrant county. Need to take a deeper look at the data. Could be access to medical facilities in Mexico border towns - that would be some fascinating data. Looks like the data is pulled from here - https://ghdx.healthdata.org/about-ghdx/ghdx-records-explained https://ghdx.healthdata.org/about-ghdx/ghdx-records-explaine...
- silisili 4y agoHispanics live longer than white people, who live longer than black people (look at the Black Belt). It's hard to simply blame economics when some very poor Hispanic regions outlive some wealthy black/white ones. I'm not versed enough to know whether race itself plays any significant roles, or if it's more cultural, but it's certainly eye opening as a factor.
- danans 4y ago> Hispanics live longer than white people, who live longer than black people (look at the Black Belt). There is a glaring counterexample: Atlanta, a prosperous majority black city, has very high life expectancy, but the surrounding rural areas in Georgia, majority white and poor, have low life expectancy. Birmingham Alabama is another similar example.
- rgmerk 4y agoNobody has explicitly connected the other damning life expectancy visualisation on Twitter yet, so it’s worth linking to it: https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1641799627128143873?s=46&t=DaAXtHry1UFibs2tZAnZfg https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1641799627128143873?... The difference in life expectancy between the UK and the US is mostly down to young Americans dying from guns, drugs, and cars; my guess is much of the differences within the US are attributable to the same factors.
- portmanteur 4y agoThese sorts of charts are meaningless without being broken down by race. I did a quick search for "US Mortality Rate by Race" and I found CDC documents showing that African Americans have roughly 35% higher age-adjusted mortality than non-Hispanic Whites [0], and have on average 7 year shorter life expectancy at birth [1]. When people show maps where the American South has seemingly worse outcomes than the rest of the country, it's important to remember that the demographic makeup is totally different. [0]: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db456.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db456.pdf page 2 [1]: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr71/nvsr71-01.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr71/nvsr71-01.pdf page 2
- sparker72678 4y agoThe article explains that the result holds when controlling for race (and income, and education). Yes, there are racial disparities in life expectancy. Still, people of all races in the US are behind their European counterparts in life expectancy.
- rgmerk 4y agoAnd British people at the same income decile have much longer life expectancies than Americans of the same income decile, despite the fact that Americans at every income decile (except perhaps maybe the very poorest) are richer in absolute terms than Brits.
- thrdbndndn 4y ago
- UncleOxidant 4y agoInteresting choice of Blue and Red there.
- fooker 4y agoFor those who are immediately thinking of the political angle, compare Utah and Oregon.
- reducesuffering 4y agoUmm... There is a strong political correlation here. Even the one exception you're thinking of, doesn't buck the trend, as all the Democrat/Blue parts of Oregon and Utah are high life-expectancy and the Republican/Red rural parts are not.
- newfriend 4y ago> Umm... There is a strong political correlation here. Umm... No, there isn't. Look at the entire midwest/central US. See these two maps: * From the OP: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FsuBjJeaQAAv8EE?format=jpg&name=small https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FsuBjJeaQAAv8EE?format=jpg&name=... * 2020 presidential: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/2020_United_States_presidential_election_results_map_by_county.svg/555px-2020_United_States_presidential_election_results_map_by_county.svg.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/20... It's much more correlated with: * Poverty rate: https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2018/comm/acs-5yr-poverty-all-counties/_jcr_content/root/responsivegrid/embeddableimage1245.coreimg.jpeg/1543960755268/acs-5yr-poverty-rate-all-counties.jpeg https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2018/comm/acs-... The color choices of the original map appear to have intended to lead you into thinking a certain way, which appears to have worked.
- reducesuffering 4y agoWhile it looks like poverty rate is more correlated, idk how you look at those maps and see anything but an obvious political correlation, albeit not perfect. What do the stats say? "Among 3110 U.S counties and Washington, D.C., change in life expectancy at the county level was negatively associated with Republican share of the vote in the 2020 Presidential election" https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8209240/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8209240/
- pg_bot 4y agoOne thing that also should be pointed out is the race gap in medical outcomes. When you look at the statistics Black Americans face a higher risk of stroke, heart attacks, cancer mortality, infant mortality, maternal mortality, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, pneumonia, etc. In almost every leading cause of mortality in the United States there is a significant gap between Native Americans and Black Americans and the rest of the population. My sense is that there is a combination of culture and poverty that is causing this gap to occur. Poverty doesn't seem to be the sole cause IMO (although it's probably the biggest factor) because white people and asian people experience similar levels of poverty but asians live way longer.
- sparker72678 4y agoThe article explains that the gap still exists, even after controlling for race. Yes, white women in the US will live (much) longer than black men on average. Yet their UK counterparts will live longer still.
- sammalloy 4y agoTake a look at the data in the commonwealth fund report for comparison. It’s not culture and poverty per se, it’s that unlike every modern and industrialized country in the world, the US lacks a universal healthcare system that serves all of its citizens fairly and proportionally regardless of race or culture. That’s the missing factor. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2022/apr/health-and-health-care-women-reproductive-age https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2...
- thrdbndndn 4y agoI'm surprised this shitty visualization made it here out of all places. The colorbar is "clearly" picked to make things more dramatic: the "middle" isn't centered (red part is longer), each end has a sizable chunk that basically has the same dark color. Also isn't the dominant factors simply poverty? One of course can go further and discuss why these regions are poorer (which IMO is history), but the direct cause of low life expectancy variation in the US is pretty clear to me to be poverty than secondary things like life choices and/or policies. OTOH, the fact the US as a whole is significantly lower than many other developed countries is something more interesting.
- jerojero 4y agoIt's really depressing that, given the good data that we have available and the different compared experienced from other countries and public policy research efforts from our academics that the political system is simply incapable of producing the right policies to remedy these situations. I mean, it seems to me like there's so much that gets confused in the public debate that most people voting for their representative have actually no idea what they're actually voting for. The political stage is filled with so much misinformation (which includes lies and omissions) that it has become very difficult for people to make the little decision power they have a good decision. In many ways, I think the political system encourage a sort of "package deal" policy making. When in reality people will have positions all over the political spectrum. And most importantly, I think people are not even given the opportunity to change their minds to begin with. Misinformation and lack of opportunity to deliberate is really hurting the policies that are being adopted by most states and this is very concerning. Of course, we shouldn't expect people to be concerned about everything at all times and be completely immersed in every issue out there. But there are plenty of ideas out there that seek to find middle of the ground solutions between engagement and influence. It just feels really bad that people are so concerned about closing the holes made by the faulty system that they don't stop and wonder that maybe a lot of these holes are natural consequences of the system's design to begin with.