Americans live shorter lives than citizens of almost every other developed country

Americans live shorter lives than citizens of almost every other developed country

www.guardian.co.uk

And while it has the second-highest income per head in the world, the United States ranks 42nd in terms of life expectancy.

These are some of the startling conclusions from a major new report which attempts to explain why the world's number-one economy has slipped to 12th place - from 2nd in 1990- in terms of human development.

(visit the link for the full news article)

We spend so much more than any other country on all of these big drug companies, yet this report comes out?

I am really p1$$ed at the 48 billion dollars Bush just signed in AIDS relief for Africa yesterday without the American peoples consent. These are our Tax dollars people, this 48 billion dollars could have been used in our country for cancer or stimulating the economy.

I like how Micheal Savage put it on his show yesterday, " We are a second world country, Dubai is now a 1st world country, yet we sign checks out of thin air for 48 billion dollars like we have the money to spend."

errr, I cannot fully express my anger over this on here....Lets just print more and more money and cause more inflation on the American people....what an Idiot!!! All of you Idiots in the Senate as well for approving it!! Get the %@#$ out of our office, you are no longer representing the American people.

-Kdial1

www.guardian.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 17-7-2008 by kdial1]

I agree completely with you about the AIDS crap. We should always put our own house in order before we try to help a foreign interest. ALWAYS. If there's one starving child in the United States then not so much as a cent of aid money should be allowed to leave our borders at the federal level. This includes for disasters, epidemics, and general poverty. And if you think Bush is bad, Obama is a million times worse, wanting to spend $800 Billion in American tax payer dollars on combating foreign poverty. Talk about a globalist agenda...

As for the article itself, I'm reluctant to believe anything a United Nations agency reports. They have proven time and again that they cannot be trusted and they skew data to fit their agendas. For example, they claim 14% of Americans are iliterate... but in what language? I'd be willing to bet they are counting Mexicans who can't read, write, God even speak English as being iliterate for this particular report. www.measureofamerica.org... According to this, 84% of American adults have graduated high school... In order for the 14% figure to be correct, that would have to assume that around 88% of high school dropouts are illiterate morons, which I think is safe to say is not the case. Many high school dropouts have GEDs and many of them are relatively smart people who didn't get a degree due to outside factors other than being illiterate.

I totally believe their comment on Mississippi, however... I'm probably the most backwoods, redneck, hick jackass that routinely posts at ATS and even I view Mississippi as being backwards. The US DOES have federally mandated maternity leave, BTW. Clinton signed the Family Medical Leave Act... what they mean is paid maternity leave, which is something else entirely. With just an iota of planning you can get a fairly inexpensive insurance package from a company like Aflac that will pay around 80% of your sallary while on FMLA, so the idea that it's the government's responsibillity to legislate something that is privately available at a reasonable cost is objectionable to me.

reply to post by kdial1


I think this article just goes to show you that most Americans are struggling today whereas only a decade ago the number of Americans struggling was a minority. As more and more Americans inch closer to poverty or paycheck to paycheck living, it drags down the life expectancy of the whole country. America is a land of dichotomies.

I blame the low life expectancy on stress, drugs (both legal and illegal), and poor diet. I expect it to get worse in the future as more people will find it extremely stressful to maintain/obtain middle class status.