
How Working-Class Life Is Killing Americans, in Charts - clairity
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/06/opinion/working-class-death-rate.html
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intopieces
I found this interesting, because I associate education with lack of faith,
but that is not the case in the US:

>People without college degrees are also less likely to attend church

So I looked into it:

Moreover, the majority of American adults (71%) identify as Christians. And
among Christians, those with higher levels of education appear to be just as
religious as those with less schooling, on average. In fact, highly educated
Christians are more likely than less-educated Christians to say they are
weekly churchgoers.

[https://www.pewforum.org/2017/04/26/in-america-does-more-
edu...](https://www.pewforum.org/2017/04/26/in-america-does-more-education-
equal-less-religion/)

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atomicity
This seems to be a significant (and sad) trend.

It's also good to note that the increase in college grads doesn't offset this
trend.

"Younger Americans are more likely to have attained a four-year degree than
older groups. Among Americans between the ages of 25 to 34, 37 percent have at
least a bachelor’s degree. Among those 55 and older, just under 30 percent
have a four-year degree." (Source: [https://thehill.com/homenews/state-
watch/326995-census-more-...](https://thehill.com/homenews/state-
watch/326995-census-more-americans-have-college-degrees-than-ever-before))

It seems like the reasons suggested have merit: the numbers start to rise
steadily after trade deals that facilitate globalization.

I noticed that one of the reasons mentioned seemed a bit weak:

> “Many people used to associate the meaning of their life with what their
> corporation or institution was doing,” says Deaton, a Nobel laureate in
> economics. Miners and factory workers identified themselves as such.
> Warehouse workers, especially those whose paycheck is signed by a staffing
> company, rarely feel the same connection.

I wonder if social media and entertainment could be a partial contributor to
the numbers increase. With how distracting and/or addictive internet
entertainment is nowadays, it's easy for people to lose enough time to become
"trapped" and unable to solve their problems.

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sudoaza
TLDR; just check the charts.

Persons without a college degree die more often of suicide/substance abuse,
marry less, are less happy and suffer more chronic pain than those with
college degree. Here college degree appears to be a proxy for income and
income inequality being the main driver of these effects.

~~~
trevyn
And your daily reminder that correlation is not causation.

