"The average American my age is roughly six times more likely to die in the coming year than his counterpart in Switzerland.
The true test of a civilization may be the answer to a basic question: Can it keep its children alive?
....
How’s the U.S. doing on the civilization test?
....
Last year, I called the U.S. the rich death trap of the modern world. The “rich” part is important to observe and hard to overstate. The typical American spends almost 50 percent more each year than the typical Brit, and a trucker in Oklahoma earns more than a doctor in Portugal.

This extra cash ought to buy us more years of living. For most countries, higher incomes translate automatically into longer lives. But not for today’s Americans. A new analysis by John Burn-Murdoch, a data journalist at the Financial Times, shows that the typical American is 100 percent more likely to die than the typical Western European at almost every age from birth until retirement.

Imagine I offered you a pill and told you that taking this mystery medication would have two effects. First, it would increase your disposable income by almost half. Second, it would double your odds of dying in the next 365 days. To be an average American is to fill a lifetime prescription of that medication and take the pill nightly."

A paradox? Not necessarily.
It is a nation of immigrants under the influence.
People spend more to make themselves unhappier.

On Friday, April 21, 2023 at 4:34:29 PM UTC, ltlee1 wrote:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/04/america-mortality-rate-guns-health/673799/

> "The average American my age is roughly six times more likely to die in the coming year than his counterpart in Switzerland.
> The true test of a civilization may be the answer to a basic question: Can it keep its children alive?
> ...
> How’s the U.S. doing on the civilization test?
> ...
> Last year, I called the U.S. the rich death trap of the modern world. The “rich” part is important to observe and hard to overstate. The typical American spends almost 50 percent more each year than the typical Brit, and a trucker in Oklahoma earns more than a doctor in Portugal.
>
> This extra cash ought to buy us more years of living. For most countries, higher incomes translate automatically into longer lives. But not for today’s Americans. A new analysis by John Burn-Murdoch, a data journalist at the Financial Times, shows that the typical American is 100 percent more likely to die than the typical Western European at almost every age from birth until retirement.
>
> Imagine I offered you a pill and told you that taking this mystery medication would have two effects. First, it would increase your disposable income by almost half. Second, it would double your odds of dying in the next 365 days. To be an average American is to fill a lifetime prescription of that medication and take the pill nightly."
>
> A paradox? Not necessarily.
> It is a nation of immigrants under the influence.
> People spend more to make themselves unhappier.

On Friday, April 21, 2023 at 4:34:29 PM UTC, ltlee1 wrote:
> "The average American my age is roughly six times more likely to die in the coming year than his counterpart in Switzerland.
> The true test of a civilization may be the answer to a basic question: Can it keep its children alive?
> ...
> How’s the U.S. doing on the civilization test?
> ...
> Last year, I called the U.S. the rich death trap of the modern world. The “rich” part is important to observe and hard to overstate. The typical American spends almost 50 percent more each year than the typical Brit, and a trucker in Oklahoma earns more than a doctor in Portugal.
>
> This extra cash ought to buy us more years of living. For most countries, higher incomes translate automatically into longer lives. But not for today’s Americans. A new analysis by John Burn-Murdoch, a data journalist at the Financial Times, shows that the typical American is 100 percent more likely to die than the typical Western European at almost every age from birth until retirement.
>
> Imagine I offered you a pill and told you that taking this mystery medication would have two effects. First, it would increase your disposable income by almost half. Second, it would double your odds of dying in the next 365 days. To be an average American is to fill a lifetime prescription of that medication and take the pill nightly."
>
> A paradox? Not necessarily.
> It is a nation of immigrants under the influence.
> People spend more to make themselves unhappier.

Two questions:
1. To what degree could question the contribution of medical measures to the decline of mortality in 20th century US?
The following graph clearly indicates declining mortality well before increasing medical spending as percentage of GDP.

https://ashley-everly.s3.amazonaws.com/necessity-of-vaccination/decline-in-disease-mortality/the-questionable-contribution-of-medical-measures-to-the-decline-of-mortality-in-the-united-states-in-the-twentieth-century/page_6.jpg

One does not have to view the issue as one of all-or-none. Nevertheless, to the degree that the survey was accurate, it raises another question.

2. What besides medical measures as reflected by medical spending is contributing to making a nation healthy, then but now more recently?