7 ms·
This is a bit of a frame trap. Here’s another metric: ==2021== Life expectancy in EU: 80 Life expectancy in US: 76 ==Rolling back to 2008== Life expectancy
by janalsncm 3y ago
This is a bit of a frame trap. Here’s another metric:
==2021==
Life expectancy in EU: 80
Life expectancy in US: 76
==Rolling back to 2008==
Life expectancy in EU: 79
Life expectancy in US: 78
What’s the point? Maybe GDP isn’t the most important indicator. The US can double it’s GDP by making healthcare more expensive and extracting every last dime from the elderly, but can it actually improve quality of life for people? [1]
[1] https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?locations=EU-US https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?location...
- sonicshadow 3y agoWhat's the point of living an extra few years either? I'd rather die at 70 after having lived a healthy life, than 80 and suffered the last 10 years
- wizofaus 3y agoI'm fairly sure in countries where the life expectancy is lower you're more likely to suffer in your final years.
- zerodensity 3y agoYou say that now. I bet you are going to be dancing by a different tune at 70.
- sonicshadow 3y agoThink you're intentionally misreading what I'm saying, thanks for that
- zerodensity 3y agoAm I? I think not. You are saying that you would rather live a shorter time in good health than a longer time being unhealthy at the end. I am saying that the day will come when you start to deteriorate, get aches, getting slower, maybe even critically ill. During all that you will most likely still not want to die. People suffer in every age group most of them don't want to die. Why do you think you would?
- sonicshadow 3y agoIt seems like you know me better than i do!
- yCombLinks 3y agoIt seems like you're a poor communicator, because that's the only reasonable way to interpret your comment.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sonicshadow 3y ago[flagged]
- ffhhttt 3y agoIt was actually sarcasm?
- landemva 3y agoYour body, your choice.
- YetAnotherNick 3y agoI think suffering is based on life expectancy and not fixed. Life expectancy was 50 years not a long back, but still people suffered last 5 years or so of their life.
- rjh29 3y agoA larger percentage of people are dying young. It's an average...
- Loocid 3y agoWhy do you assume you'll suffer from 70-80?
- mr_toad 3y agoLow life average life expectancy is usually caused by people dying young. Gun violence, automobile accidents, obesity, an opioid epidemic…
- afterburner 3y agoJust moves the suffering years to 60-70.
- cypress66 3y agoMost of that life expectancy gap is due to obesity I'd guess.
- LilBytes 3y agoAnd a strong difference in quality health care outcomes for people of all ages.
- nonethewiser 3y agoOutcomes in the US are high. So are the costs though.
- hgomersall 3y agoWhich means, if you can't afford it, the outcomes are low.
- umeshunni 3y agoMost of it is due to the opioid crisis in the US afaik.
- mikeyouse 3y agoCovid, overdoses & accidents accounted for 2/3 of the decline; https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/why-life-expectancy-in-the-us-is-falling-202210202835 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/why-life-expectancy-in-t...
- arc-in-space 3y agoEh, sure, but here it's worth pointing out that obesity is a significant factor in covid deaths.
- scythe 3y agoObesity has also increased in the EU.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ljlolel 3y agoMost of the gap is actually people doing pension fraud due to overly generous state benefits.
- zerodensity 3y agoWhy do you think that?
- ljlolel 3y agohttps://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2019/8/8/20758813/secrets-ultra-elderly-supercentenarians-fraud-error https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2019/8/8/20758813/secrets-u... https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/704080v2.full https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/704080v2.full
- nemo44x 3y agoThat’s a poor metric. The USA offers you more potential. It’s up to you. The USA also has a higher percentage of young people and more of them are dying from drugs. That skews a metric line that. Do it by cohort and it’s different.
- Kapura 3y agoWhat, specifically, do you mean by "The USA offers you more potential?"
- nemo44x 3y agoMore opportunity. More capacity to improve your lot in life. More luxury. More space. It goes on. There’s a reason millions more people from the EU live in the USA than the other way. Or why there’s a line 100s of millions long to come to the USA. Nowhere is perfect but as a world traveler I’d say the USA is pretty great. What I have found most interesting over the last 20 years is that the conversation has moved from USA/EU to USA/Asia. Europe has become lodged somewhere between that and Africa/South America but Euros haven’t noticed it yet. Business has.
- bjornasm 3y ago>There’s a reason millions more people from the EU live in the USA than the other way. Or why there’s a line 100s of millions long to come to the USA. That the EU has 100million more inhabitants, a history of relocating to the US or american culture and language being extremely present all over western society? >Nowhere is perfect but as a world traveler I’d say the USA is pretty great. "Nothing is like home" - news at 11.
- nonethewiser 3y ago> a history of relocating to the US or american culture and language being extremely present all over western society? Well these just reinforce his point
- AbrahamParangi 3y agoThese stats drive me up the wall because the US is more diverse than every single European country. The life expectancy in California is 81 and in Alabama it’s 74. That’s the difference between the UK and like, Latvia. This matters because when you look at these crude aggregate stats, people naively assume that it means that everything is a bit worse but the actual American story is usually more like broad prosperity with some truly awful outcomes for anyone who falls through the (very wide) cracks.
- bjornasm 3y agoWhat a weird way of framing it. The USA is compared with EU, so it doesn't matter if USA is more diverse than single european countries. As you point out, EU is also very diverse.
- EGreg 3y agoBut EU is more diverse than any single US state! So like... nyeh
- ajross 3y agoSurely the point was that the difference between internal regions of the EU and USA are much higher than that between the averages. Someone worried about lifespan in either would do much better to look at local outcomes and the reasons for them (c.f. figuring out why Latvia lags the France, or what's wrong in Alabama that Massachusetts is so far ahead) than it is to dither over what the people across the ocean are doing.
- ffhhttt 3y agothese oversimplified averages don’t really reflect anyone’s actual situation either
- ChatGTP 3y agoHave you been to Europe? It's really diverse.
- failuser 3y agoEU has a bunch of states that have been in the Soviet Block not so long ago, even 3 countries from the USSR. This is way more diverse than USA at least as far as the economics go.
- throwawaylinux 3y agoWhat is a "frame trap", and why do people get irrationally upset by the US doing well at something or the EU doing poorly? This post is about GDP growth. What has life expectancy got to do with it, and how are you contributing to any discussion? Has anybody here said that "GDP is the most important indicator"?
- ChatGTP 3y agoI actually think it's the opposite, I always see Americans getting really snarky about Europe, I could go back and find plenty of examples but I have better things to do. Personally I think average Americans have a hard time imaging a world where there is more to life than money. Ultimately whenever I see these "murica" centric posts, I remember them flying in emergency medical supplies from China and everybody being upset about how the worlds greatest super power didn't have enough supplies for their own medical staff. Stay humble.
- fragmede 3y agoGiven how pervasive money is in everything we do, even just hiking in nature (how much did those hiking boots cost you? Did you get a cheap pair or an expensive pair? How long will they last until you have to buy a new pair?), or just having friends over to chat (their money status has an effect on how they're doing). There's more to life than money, but it's pretty central.
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago>There's more to life than money, but it's pretty central. Europeans miss the point that you still need money to fund all those generous social benefits we have. Without money and a stagnating economy there will be less welfare to go around. I've lost track of how many financially illiterate people told me "I don't care about the economy, as long as we still have great quality of life" who miss the part where that great quality of life is funded by that same economy they don't care about.
- 3y ago
- seydor 3y agoSo they live less and STILL make twice the income?
- thatguy0900 3y agoPeople retire and not only don't have an income, they can take money back from the government. Especially if you live in a place where the government actually has some safety nets set in place for you. If your goal is maximum money earned per person per year you probably want them to die at like 65 or something.
- failuser 3y agoThose are different people. The ones who die early don’t have disposable incomes that are high. At least on average.
- afterburner 3y agoThe EU has better social support. However, the US dodged the austerity fad bullet in the 2010s. A lot of the EU really fell for it hard. Austerity is a fantastic way to inhibit growth.
- walthamstow 3y agoAusterity means to spend less on public services and infrastructure. Doesn't that mean the US was in near-constant austerity prior to Biden and the IRA?
- afterburner 3y agoAusterity means to aggressive CUTS to spending in many different sectors. Much, much worse than not keeping up with rising maintenance demands. The UK for example made deep cuts to healthcare and education, cost a lot of people jobs right at the worst possible time (on the heels of the Great Recession). Many smaller worse off countries did even worse. The austerity in Europe was far, far worse than anything that was happening in the US. The US government finance establishment for whatever reason was not infected by that particular bug. The US passed a large stimulus bill and in general was in a stimulus mindset. Europe on the other hand thought it could cut its way out of a crisis.
- HDThoreaun 3y agoThe US life expectancy is low because Americans engage in riskier behavior like getting fat and opioids. Why is that a bad thing? If people want to do things that lowers their life expectancy they should be allowed to.