9 ms·

IMO a substantial (not 100%) root cause of all this is that many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments,

IMO a substantial (not 100%) root cause of all this is that many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort (meaning, unsustainable) permanently, so they turn to excessive amounts of calories, caffeine, prescription or illegal drugs, to try to continue to function as long as possible. This leads to all kinds of medical issues down the road, which then is handled by emergency medical services, or very severe health problems that are very difficult to treat.

jayd16 2y ago
You don't need to be busy to guzzle down soda, Gatorade, sweet tea, etc. Its just pervasive.
lithocarpus 2y ago
I imagine this is a substantial cause. And, sugar is also a physical addiction, and many children are given it in varying degrees of excessive amounts from childhood even if they're not particularly subjected to stress. There is a spectrum of kinds of sugars but I imagine they could be weighted by something like glycemic index for measuring the degree of impact.
swatcoder 2y ago
Perhaps, and we should continue to work on that, but exploitative and exhausting labor has been an issue for ten millenia or so at least. We may well not see it fixed in our lives. But the particular failings of the modern western diet are relatively new and might still be remedied or reversed without waiting for the whole labor and exploitation issue to be sorted.
- ethbr1 2y ago
  The difference is that the previous methods of exhausting labor provided physical exercise as a side effect. As brutal as that was on the body, it did have some health benefits. In contrast to modern American/Asian work culture, which is high stress and sedentary.
  - swatcoder 2y ago
    While there exists a lot of sedentary work in the US and that has consequences, there's still a great deal of physical work done in the US as well, and a very high number of non-working people with plenty of time for personal exercise if they wanted to pursue it. Yet the profound wellness problems we're talking about apply to all of those groups.
    - ethbr1 2y ago
      The hollowing out of American agriculture and manufacturing employment (sequentially) was a major shift, that moved those employees to sedentary jobs. Optional exercise (after work) is not the same this as mandatory exercise (for work).
  - lithocarpus 2y ago
    There's some truth there, but no matter how active one is, one can still out-eat the exercise with sugar.
  - djaouen 2y ago
    > which is high stress and sedentary Soon, we might even reach low stress and not back-breaking! *Gasp*!
    - bobmcnamara 2y ago
      Some of us grew up with childhood friends who cleaned the meat plants at night. A practice that continues to this day. You can always tell - they stink of bleach in the morning.
  - sydbarrett74 2y ago
    And since the Industrial Revolution, any labour is highly repetitive and therefore leads to RSI.
    - optimalsolver 2y ago
      Recursive self-improvement?
- AngryData 2y ago
  Before the industrial age sustained exhausting labor was still a temporary thing reserved for planting and harvest times, and even then you were still deciding your own hours, it was just obviously the most profitable time to put in the most work so people did it.
- black_13 2y ago
  [dead]
- WalterBright 2y ago
  > exploitative and exhausting labor That was necessary because of the low productivity of people.
  - satvikpendem 2y ago
    Not sure why you're being downvoted, it is objectively true that people in the past were less productive than today, not necessarily because they were lazier, but because technology has gotten better. It has been the case since civilization started, as we were 99% farmers until we became productive enough to stratify our division of labor, something that every world history student learns.
- sapphicsnail 2y ago
  Workers in industrial societies work way more hours than their ancestors did. There's enough resources for people to work less hours.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    Which goods would you cut out?
    - sapphicsnail 2y ago
      Most people I know spend a lot of time doing unnecessary things for their job. I don't have a magic solution to fix all the bureaucratic bullshit people are subject to but acknowledging it's a problem is a start.
      - s1artibartfast 2y ago
        Sure, there are lots of things that are inefficient. I think everyone recognizes that. That doesnt mean there is an obvious and viable alternative.
    - _DeadFred_ 2y ago
      Stock buybacks. They serve nothing but short term driving up of profits purely to increase the value of management's stock options. They have no place in the functions/purpose of a healthy stock market.
      - s1artibartfast 2y ago
        How would that free up worker time while preserving the same amount of physical goods and services available for consumption? Lets say every company stops buybacks, that doesnt mean workers can make more "stuff" with fewer hours.
        satvikpendem 2y ago
        It's because the people who say things like the above have no real alternative solution in place and simply say things that sound good in theory (or are even wholly unrelated, as you explained) but fundamentally don't change anything about the world.
- Avshalom 2y ago
  Surviving to adulthood is also relatively new.
cj 2y ago
I think this was also true 50 years ago. I’m unconvinced that we’re working harder today compared to the past. I do agree society overall is higher stress mainly due to the internet and constant attention grabbing in all directions.
- abnercoimbre 2y ago
  Couple that with lack of in-person communities. They are ephemeral at best now.
- epicureanideal 2y ago
  It may not be physically as hard but I think the work is more precarious, and the cost of living is much higher for basics like housing, so the stress may be higher.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    > but I think the work is more precarious It was a lot easier to fire people in those days. > the cost of living is much higher for basics like housing Around Seattle there are still a number of older homes. They are tiny and cheaply built compared to modern homes.
    - llm_trw 2y ago
      50 years ago mean 1975, not 1935. It was a lot harder to fire people then.
- _DeadFred_ 2y ago
  The repetitiveness of modern labor has moved full body physical labour to single point of failure on your body tasks with the likelier end result being you will end up crippled in some way (and having to just work with it) or have other overuse injuries which then leads to constant chronic pain.
hnpolicestate 2y ago
"toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort (meaning, unsustainable) permanently, so they turn to excessive amounts of calories, caffeine, prescription or illegal drugs, to try to continue to function as long as possible." I've basically succumb to everything you list to survive working in a maddeningly dysfunctional school. And it's precisely "function as long as possible ". I have to disassociate somehow from the incompetence and corruption around me. Ativan and diet Coke help. I assume billions globally are doing the same thing to cope. The best metaphor I've come up with is that it feels like I play for a sub 60 win baseball team.
- black_13 2y ago
  [dead]
ajross 2y ago
> many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort That seems spun. I don't think any of that is substantiated in any kind of rigorous way. Median americans today are wealthier than any population in human history, are working more than their compatriots elsewhere in the world but less than their parents, have more leisure time, travel more, etc... There's lots of things to complaint about, and there always will be. But really this kind of "Everything is Awful" rhetoric is just vibes. Yes, life sucks. It sucked worse for your ancestors.
- bluefirebrand 2y ago
  > Yes, life sucks. It sucked worse for your ancestors. Most of the time you are right, but the Baby Boomers are a pretty big outlier in this regard There is no question that the average Baby Boomer has had it much better than their children and grandchildren have
  - ajross 2y ago
    Not numerically. Median real income today is more than twice what it was in the 60's. FWIW: there's a... sociological problem with arguments framed around that. When you measure US citizen wealth in the 1960's it looks unimpressive[1]. When you picture a "baby boomer", you see a working class family with no debt behind a white picket fence in a beautiful new subdivision living a great life on just the one income. And those families existed! So what gives? You're looking at a family headed by a working class white man. Not everyone could get those "working class" jobs that supported a family in the suburbs. There was plenty of poverty in the 60's, it was just hidden along with the single moms and minority communities we didn't record. Things today are a lot more even, which means that the "white picket fence" demographic perceives things going in the opposite direction from what's actually happening. [1] Relative to today, anyway. The US in the 60's was obviously an extremely wealthy country!
    - bluefirebrand 2y ago
      > Not numerically. Median real income today is more than twice what it was in the 60's The 60s is not really relevant to any discussion about Baby Boomers, who would have been teens at the oldest in the 60s Compare the years they were in their prime
pengaru 2y ago
What matters is that the most conveniently accessible food isn't the damn dear worst thing you should be regularly eating large quantities of. Our food environment is the opposite of that. The stress only exacerbates the impulsive/comfort eating side of things, but it wouldn't be such a big deal if everyone were om nomming tasty organic carrots all day every day. Orange skin, sure, but not obesity and heart disease.
JackYoustra 2y ago
...or it's just the default choice and people choose the default choice when they're thinking of other things?
CyberDildonics 2y ago
These are the same kind of vague, hand wavy distractions that would have been used to excuse or muddy the waters around tobacco 30 years ago. "Probably just stress" is not an excuse that explains the systemic health problems that come from excess sugar.
- dylan604 2y ago
  Has bigSugar been tweaking the formula of the additives used to make the product more addicting? Let’s not forget how heinous bigTobacco behaved. Refining corn into high fructose corn syrup still isn’t the same to me, but their lobbying campaigning is the same. If it comes out that they have knowledge of adverse effects of their product and still pushed that hard, then they should be dealt with in the harshest of punishment. Otherwise, comparison to bigTobacco isn’t quite right
  - portaouflop 2y ago
    Of course they have knowledge of the adverse effects of sugar and are lobbying to prevent any legislation trying to curtail putting it into literally everything
  - CyberDildonics 2y ago
    Additives have nothing to do with it and are a complete distraction. Sugar has detrimental health effects and excessive sugar has more extreme health effects. The important thing now is that this is accepted and understood instead of people casting doubt like "maybe it's just stress".
WalterBright 2y ago
Bone studies of American colonists showed they regularly overloaded their bones, and died young.
taeric 2y ago
I confess I'm not clear what you are looking for the root cause of? I would be interested in seeing the costs of, for example, emergency medical services laid out by demographics. My understanding was that emergency services are very localized to where they are used. With perverse incentives hitting their uses. That said, in specific context of this article, this comment reads as a deflection away from the high levels of sugar being consumed in the US. Curious to hear why you'd think we are not high on those numbers.
inglor_cz 2y ago
Psychologization of disease is often an indicator of the fact that we don't fully understand the cause-and-effect yet. Note how "stress" has taken approximately the same explanatory role that "sin" used to have two or three centuries ago.
dangus 2y ago
What does this have to do with sugary drinks though? It’s very easy to isolate out people who drink sugary drinks to people who don’t who are in the same general environment with similar life pressures. Also, you are getting kind of loose with your definition of negative substances. Coffee is on your list despite being generally known to be neutral to good for you: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/top-evidence-based-health-benefits-of-coffee https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/top-evidence-based-heal...
the_cat_kittles 2y ago
japanese diet is low on sugar, so your point is wrong
- portaouflop 2y ago
  They have the same problems of overwork and stress as the US though- plus adding in western diet getting more and more popular. Looking at numbers from 2021 Japan had about half the rate of diabetes compared to the US: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/diabetes-rates-by-country/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/diabetes-rates-by-countr...
from-nibly 2y ago
Keep it up, how else are nurses going to have a job?
DiscourseFan 2y ago
There's always decent paying jobs for more beauracratized elements that require relatively little effort and pay at least enough to live off of! People enjoy working hard, and with a college degree there is often no need to work hard if you don't want to.
snarf21 2y ago
It has more to do with the food industrial complex in the US. A lot of the "sugar" in US foods is corn syrup, which has been subsidized ~$48B in the last 25 years. Most low fat foods are just replaced with double the sugar to make them more palatable. Although it as gotten slightly better, the food pyramid is somehow still the responsibility of the USDA; whose job it is to great food surplus. It should always been part of HHS because of the massive cost consequences, especially by the time people are on Medicare.
- bobmcnamara 2y ago
  I remember this! It was Nixon!
TuringNYC 2y ago
>> IMO a substantial (not 100%) root cause of all this is that many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort (meaning, unsustainable) permanently, so they turn to excessive amounts of calories, caffeine, prescription or illegal drugs, to try to continue to function as long as possible. I'm sure there are many truths and probably different realities for different cohorts of individuals. I will share a personal story which might seem almost shocking for GenZ+ as they enter the workforce: - My dad had a normal degree from a normal university in Accounting - My had had a normal 9-5 job. No family connection/etc, he was an immigrant - My dad was able to afford a home for us -- in the city -- on his salary alone (not a dual income). The homeprice:annualsalary ratio was 2:1. If he God-forbid lost his salary both my mom and dad would have tried to look for a job to help finances, most normal jobs would cover the mortgage/taxes Not to say there werent laborers in the 1970s, etc, but this was a very common scenario. It allowed you to work to meet needs and spend the rest of your time with family. You didnt have 5 espressos to try and crank more pull-requests at night after the kids fall asleep.
- satvikpendem 2y ago
  People always quote the 1950s to 80s as some golden age, and surely it was for some, not all who lived it, like your father, but it was due to the very specific circumstances of World War 2 and how only the US was not destroyed while much of Europe and Asia was. We were able to lend a lot of money to these countries and rise our standard of living significantly, but that is the exception that proves the rule. Recency bias especially is prevalent for this sort of thinking. Unless you want another world war, that time period is simply irreplicable.
  - TuringNYC 2y ago
    You raise good points, and I certainly do not hope for another world war. I do hope a different thing though -- normal interest rates (normal being something different than what we've seen in the past 30yrs). One thing you'll see in the mid-90s and beyond is artificially lowered rates, which cheapen money. Low rates boost asset prices, so they are great for asset owners (and there are very few asset owners in the US on a % basis.) This doest really help normal people, because while borrowing becomes cheaper, prices go up commensurately. Debt:income ratios inflate. Costs inflate overall. Overall it hurts normal people because you end up with the same outcome but more leverage and hence more risk. Worse, because rates are low, income-seekers (e.g., insurance companies, foundations) steer away from traditional means of income (bonds) towards buying up homes, infra, assets, as they "reach for yield". Again, this just worsens the problem for everyone. With rates lowered and debt volumes ballooning, we've given a one-time boost to asset owners and in the process, spread stress and risk to all working class individuals.
_DeadFred_ 2y ago
Don't forget they are working multiple zero hour jobs. I.E. the job is at most part time so you need at least two, but the job also doesn't only not guaranty what days/shift hours you will work next week, it doesn't guarantee you will work any hours at all. Hence it is a zero hour job. Personally I think having more than 10% zero hour jobs should be illegal, as well as having multiple 'part time' positions to take the place of having full time positions.
satvikpendem 2y ago
What does that have to do with eating more sugar which seems to have a direct causal effect on becoming fatter and getting diabetes? Lots of countries over millennia have worked hard and have been stressed, often much more than us today, yet they were by and large not obese (no pun intended), the only thing that changed in the last century was the rise of processed foods with high amounts of sugar.

jayd16 2y ago

You don't need to be busy to guzzle down soda, Gatorade, sweet tea, etc. Its just pervasive.

lithocarpus 2y ago

I imagine this is a substantial cause. And, sugar is also a physical addiction, and many children are given it in varying degrees of excessive amounts from childhood even if they're not particularly subjected to stress. There is a spectrum of kinds of sugars but I imagine they could be weighted by something like glycemic index for measuring the degree of impact.

swatcoder 2y ago

Perhaps, and we should continue to work on that, but exploitative and exhausting labor has been an issue for ten millenia or so at least. We may well not see it fixed in our lives. But the particular failings of the modern western diet are relatively new and might still be remedied or reversed without waiting for the whole labor and exploitation issue to be sorted.

ethbr1 2y ago
The difference is that the previous methods of exhausting labor provided physical exercise as a side effect. As brutal as that was on the body, it did have some health benefits. In contrast to modern American/Asian work culture, which is high stress and sedentary.
- swatcoder 2y ago
  While there exists a lot of sedentary work in the US and that has consequences, there's still a great deal of physical work done in the US as well, and a very high number of non-working people with plenty of time for personal exercise if they wanted to pursue it. Yet the profound wellness problems we're talking about apply to all of those groups.
  - ethbr1 2y ago
    The hollowing out of American agriculture and manufacturing employment (sequentially) was a major shift, that moved those employees to sedentary jobs. Optional exercise (after work) is not the same this as mandatory exercise (for work).
- lithocarpus 2y ago
  There's some truth there, but no matter how active one is, one can still out-eat the exercise with sugar.
- djaouen 2y ago
  > which is high stress and sedentary Soon, we might even reach low stress and not back-breaking! *Gasp*!
  - bobmcnamara 2y ago
    Some of us grew up with childhood friends who cleaned the meat plants at night. A practice that continues to this day. You can always tell - they stink of bleach in the morning.
- sydbarrett74 2y ago
  And since the Industrial Revolution, any labour is highly repetitive and therefore leads to RSI.
  - optimalsolver 2y ago
    Recursive self-improvement?
AngryData 2y ago
Before the industrial age sustained exhausting labor was still a temporary thing reserved for planting and harvest times, and even then you were still deciding your own hours, it was just obviously the most profitable time to put in the most work so people did it.
black_13 2y ago
[dead]
WalterBright 2y ago
> exploitative and exhausting labor That was necessary because of the low productivity of people.
- satvikpendem 2y ago
  Not sure why you're being downvoted, it is objectively true that people in the past were less productive than today, not necessarily because they were lazier, but because technology has gotten better. It has been the case since civilization started, as we were 99% farmers until we became productive enough to stratify our division of labor, something that every world history student learns.
sapphicsnail 2y ago
Workers in industrial societies work way more hours than their ancestors did. There's enough resources for people to work less hours.
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  Which goods would you cut out?
  - sapphicsnail 2y ago
    Most people I know spend a lot of time doing unnecessary things for their job. I don't have a magic solution to fix all the bureaucratic bullshit people are subject to but acknowledging it's a problem is a start.
    - s1artibartfast 2y ago
      Sure, there are lots of things that are inefficient. I think everyone recognizes that. That doesnt mean there is an obvious and viable alternative.
  - _DeadFred_ 2y ago
    Stock buybacks. They serve nothing but short term driving up of profits purely to increase the value of management's stock options. They have no place in the functions/purpose of a healthy stock market.
    - s1artibartfast 2y ago
      How would that free up worker time while preserving the same amount of physical goods and services available for consumption? Lets say every company stops buybacks, that doesnt mean workers can make more "stuff" with fewer hours.
      - satvikpendem 2y ago
        It's because the people who say things like the above have no real alternative solution in place and simply say things that sound good in theory (or are even wholly unrelated, as you explained) but fundamentally don't change anything about the world.
Avshalom 2y ago
Surviving to adulthood is also relatively new.

cj 2y ago

I think this was also true 50 years ago. I’m unconvinced that we’re working harder today compared to the past. I do agree society overall is higher stress mainly due to the internet and constant attention grabbing in all directions.

abnercoimbre 2y ago
Couple that with lack of in-person communities. They are ephemeral at best now.
epicureanideal 2y ago
It may not be physically as hard but I think the work is more precarious, and the cost of living is much higher for basics like housing, so the stress may be higher.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  > but I think the work is more precarious It was a lot easier to fire people in those days. > the cost of living is much higher for basics like housing Around Seattle there are still a number of older homes. They are tiny and cheaply built compared to modern homes.
  - llm_trw 2y ago
    50 years ago mean 1975, not 1935. It was a lot harder to fire people then.
_DeadFred_ 2y ago
The repetitiveness of modern labor has moved full body physical labour to single point of failure on your body tasks with the likelier end result being you will end up crippled in some way (and having to just work with it) or have other overuse injuries which then leads to constant chronic pain.

hnpolicestate 2y ago

"toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort (meaning, unsustainable) permanently, so they turn to excessive amounts of calories, caffeine, prescription or illegal drugs, to try to continue to function as long as possible." I've basically succumb to everything you list to survive working in a maddeningly dysfunctional school. And it's precisely "function as long as possible ". I have to disassociate somehow from the incompetence and corruption around me. Ativan and diet Coke help. I assume billions globally are doing the same thing to cope. The best metaphor I've come up with is that it feels like I play for a sub 60 win baseball team.

black_13 2y ago
[dead]

ajross 2y ago

> many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort That seems spun. I don't think any of that is substantiated in any kind of rigorous way. Median americans today are wealthier than any population in human history, are working more than their compatriots elsewhere in the world but less than their parents, have more leisure time, travel more, etc... There's lots of things to complaint about, and there always will be. But really this kind of "Everything is Awful" rhetoric is just vibes. Yes, life sucks. It sucked worse for your ancestors.

bluefirebrand 2y ago
> Yes, life sucks. It sucked worse for your ancestors. Most of the time you are right, but the Baby Boomers are a pretty big outlier in this regard There is no question that the average Baby Boomer has had it much better than their children and grandchildren have
- ajross 2y ago
  Not numerically. Median real income today is more than twice what it was in the 60's. FWIW: there's a... sociological problem with arguments framed around that. When you measure US citizen wealth in the 1960's it looks unimpressive[1]. When you picture a "baby boomer", you see a working class family with no debt behind a white picket fence in a beautiful new subdivision living a great life on just the one income. And those families existed! So what gives? You're looking at a family headed by a working class white man. Not everyone could get those "working class" jobs that supported a family in the suburbs. There was plenty of poverty in the 60's, it was just hidden along with the single moms and minority communities we didn't record. Things today are a lot more even, which means that the "white picket fence" demographic perceives things going in the opposite direction from what's actually happening. [1] Relative to today, anyway. The US in the 60's was obviously an extremely wealthy country!
  - bluefirebrand 2y ago
    > Not numerically. Median real income today is more than twice what it was in the 60's The 60s is not really relevant to any discussion about Baby Boomers, who would have been teens at the oldest in the 60s Compare the years they were in their prime

pengaru 2y ago

What matters is that the most conveniently accessible food isn't the damn dear worst thing you should be regularly eating large quantities of. Our food environment is the opposite of that. The stress only exacerbates the impulsive/comfort eating side of things, but it wouldn't be such a big deal if everyone were om nomming tasty organic carrots all day every day. Orange skin, sure, but not obesity and heart disease.

JackYoustra 2y ago

...or it's just the default choice and people choose the default choice when they're thinking of other things?

CyberDildonics 2y ago

These are the same kind of vague, hand wavy distractions that would have been used to excuse or muddy the waters around tobacco 30 years ago. "Probably just stress" is not an excuse that explains the systemic health problems that come from excess sugar.

dylan604 2y ago
Has bigSugar been tweaking the formula of the additives used to make the product more addicting? Let’s not forget how heinous bigTobacco behaved. Refining corn into high fructose corn syrup still isn’t the same to me, but their lobbying campaigning is the same. If it comes out that they have knowledge of adverse effects of their product and still pushed that hard, then they should be dealt with in the harshest of punishment. Otherwise, comparison to bigTobacco isn’t quite right
- portaouflop 2y ago
  Of course they have knowledge of the adverse effects of sugar and are lobbying to prevent any legislation trying to curtail putting it into literally everything
- CyberDildonics 2y ago
  Additives have nothing to do with it and are a complete distraction. Sugar has detrimental health effects and excessive sugar has more extreme health effects. The important thing now is that this is accepted and understood instead of people casting doubt like "maybe it's just stress".

WalterBright 2y ago

Bone studies of American colonists showed they regularly overloaded their bones, and died young.

taeric 2y ago

I confess I'm not clear what you are looking for the root cause of? I would be interested in seeing the costs of, for example, emergency medical services laid out by demographics. My understanding was that emergency services are very localized to where they are used. With perverse incentives hitting their uses. That said, in specific context of this article, this comment reads as a deflection away from the high levels of sugar being consumed in the US. Curious to hear why you'd think we are not high on those numbers.

inglor_cz 2y ago

Psychologization of disease is often an indicator of the fact that we don't fully understand the cause-and-effect yet. Note how "stress" has taken approximately the same explanatory role that "sin" used to have two or three centuries ago.

dangus 2y ago

What does this have to do with sugary drinks though? It’s very easy to isolate out people who drink sugary drinks to people who don’t who are in the same general environment with similar life pressures. Also, you are getting kind of loose with your definition of negative substances. Coffee is on your list despite being generally known to be neutral to good for you: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/top-evidence-based-health-benefits-of-coffee https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/top-evidence-based-heal...

the_cat_kittles 2y ago

japanese diet is low on sugar, so your point is wrong

portaouflop 2y ago
They have the same problems of overwork and stress as the US though- plus adding in western diet getting more and more popular. Looking at numbers from 2021 Japan had about half the rate of diabetes compared to the US: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/diabetes-rates-by-country/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/diabetes-rates-by-countr...

from-nibly 2y ago

Keep it up, how else are nurses going to have a job?

DiscourseFan 2y ago

There's always decent paying jobs for more beauracratized elements that require relatively little effort and pay at least enough to live off of! People enjoy working hard, and with a college degree there is often no need to work hard if you don't want to.

snarf21 2y ago

It has more to do with the food industrial complex in the US. A lot of the "sugar" in US foods is corn syrup, which has been subsidized ~$48B in the last 25 years. Most low fat foods are just replaced with double the sugar to make them more palatable. Although it as gotten slightly better, the food pyramid is somehow still the responsibility of the USDA; whose job it is to great food surplus. It should always been part of HHS because of the massive cost consequences, especially by the time people are on Medicare.

bobmcnamara 2y ago
I remember this! It was Nixon!

TuringNYC 2y ago

>> IMO a substantial (not 100%) root cause of all this is that many Americans are highly stressed, in precarious financial positions, with toxic work environments, pushed to work at above 100% effort (meaning, unsustainable) permanently, so they turn to excessive amounts of calories, caffeine, prescription or illegal drugs, to try to continue to function as long as possible. I'm sure there are many truths and probably different realities for different cohorts of individuals. I will share a personal story which might seem almost shocking for GenZ+ as they enter the workforce: - My dad had a normal degree from a normal university in Accounting - My had had a normal 9-5 job. No family connection/etc, he was an immigrant - My dad was able to afford a home for us -- in the city -- on his salary alone (not a dual income). The homeprice:annualsalary ratio was 2:1. If he God-forbid lost his salary both my mom and dad would have tried to look for a job to help finances, most normal jobs would cover the mortgage/taxes Not to say there werent laborers in the 1970s, etc, but this was a very common scenario. It allowed you to work to meet needs and spend the rest of your time with family. You didnt have 5 espressos to try and crank more pull-requests at night after the kids fall asleep.

satvikpendem 2y ago
People always quote the 1950s to 80s as some golden age, and surely it was for some, not all who lived it, like your father, but it was due to the very specific circumstances of World War 2 and how only the US was not destroyed while much of Europe and Asia was. We were able to lend a lot of money to these countries and rise our standard of living significantly, but that is the exception that proves the rule. Recency bias especially is prevalent for this sort of thinking. Unless you want another world war, that time period is simply irreplicable.
- TuringNYC 2y ago
  You raise good points, and I certainly do not hope for another world war. I do hope a different thing though -- normal interest rates (normal being something different than what we've seen in the past 30yrs). One thing you'll see in the mid-90s and beyond is artificially lowered rates, which cheapen money. Low rates boost asset prices, so they are great for asset owners (and there are very few asset owners in the US on a % basis.) This doest really help normal people, because while borrowing becomes cheaper, prices go up commensurately. Debt:income ratios inflate. Costs inflate overall. Overall it hurts normal people because you end up with the same outcome but more leverage and hence more risk. Worse, because rates are low, income-seekers (e.g., insurance companies, foundations) steer away from traditional means of income (bonds) towards buying up homes, infra, assets, as they "reach for yield". Again, this just worsens the problem for everyone. With rates lowered and debt volumes ballooning, we've given a one-time boost to asset owners and in the process, spread stress and risk to all working class individuals.

_DeadFred_ 2y ago

Don't forget they are working multiple zero hour jobs. I.E. the job is at most part time so you need at least two, but the job also doesn't only not guaranty what days/shift hours you will work next week, it doesn't guarantee you will work any hours at all. Hence it is a zero hour job. Personally I think having more than 10% zero hour jobs should be illegal, as well as having multiple 'part time' positions to take the place of having full time positions.

satvikpendem 2y ago

What does that have to do with eating more sugar which seems to have a direct causal effect on becoming fatter and getting diabetes? Lots of countries over millennia have worked hard and have been stressed, often much more than us today, yet they were by and large not obese (no pun intended), the only thing that changed in the last century was the rise of processed foods with high amounts of sugar.