
Americans Are Among the Most Stressed People in the World, Poll Finds - enraged_camel
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/us/americans-stressful.html
======
maxxxxx
From casual observation (living here since 2000) I believe that being stressed
and "busy" is a badge of honor in the US. For example during Christmas time
everybody complains about being stressed with it. I don't remember that from
living in Germany. Christmas was downtime not a source of stress.

For a while it was also popular to be "outraged" about stuff but that seems to
have calmed down quite a bit.

~~~
Zenst
People through history have always had an outraged culture, it is just that
the goalposts of that outrage move, and occasionally rear up en-madd like a
tidal wave over what for many is innocuous unless edge-case contextualized -
which is often the case in outrage cultures.

There was a time in which people would be outraged at other people not wearing
a hat, times change, yet the ability to be upset and project that upon others
soldiers on regardless. Just today's outrage culture has a more accessible
platform to artificially embellish their outrage and societies ability to see
1% vocaly upset with outrage and presume the other 99% agree is a path that
sadly still plays out from time to time.

But let's not confuse outraged issues with real issues that don't need to be
blown up out of proportions to gain attention. That is the worrying issue
today, that so many times a small event gets recontextualized to fulfil a
narrative of outrage and promoted as such. Downing out real issues that fester
without vocal champions.

~~~
zarkov99
The biggest difference is that today outrage is incentivized, even
manufacturered, because it makes money.

~~~
rchaud
"If it bleeds, it leads" has been a common refrain for TV news programs from
decades ago. It's not new, although the mediums have shifted.

~~~
zarkov99
Yes, it's not a new trick,but it's been amped up to 11.

------
nostromo
> The findings were not all bleak for the United States. Despite having
> widespread negative experiences, Americans also generally reported more
> positive experiences, on average, than the rest of the world did.

It'd be interesting to know how they came to the decision to focus on the
negative emotions in the article.

~~~
tomschlick
Negative things always get the clicks. As the old saying goes: "If it bleeds,
it leads".

------
djakjxnanjak
I’m American, and I frequently notice that most people are always talking
about how much everything sucks. If somebody sees a movie, there is a 50/50
chance they will be talking about how they didn’t like it because they thought
the writing was awkward in one scene. When talking about a car they will
complain about how the dashboard feels. When talking about their relationships
with other people they will complain about how this person is too familiar and
that person is too distant. It’s as though everyone is employed as the Roger
Ebert of their lives and everything they come into contact with. This approach
to life seems bound to make anyone stressed even if they live in complete
prosperity. Are people like this everywhere or is this more of an American
thing?

~~~
noahmoss
Is that really a problem for things like movies and cars, though? When I watch
a film, part of the fun is critically examining and discussing it afterwards.
If I'm making a huge purchase like a car, I'd want to be extra-conscious about
things I'm not 100% satisfied with. Sure, don't be critical about everything
in life, but it has its place.

~~~
djakjxnanjak
Sure, make a careful decision when buying your car. But after you buy it, like
it! You made a big commitment, and switching costs are high, so you’ll be
happier if you feel you made the right decision.

After watching a movie, critically analyze it if that makes you happy. You
aren’t married to it because you saw it - disliking it won’t hurt you. But
when you’re thinking about whether you should go with your friend to watch a
movie they want to see, don’t agonize over it for hours, just see it or don’t.
There are a million things going on in any movie and you can always find
something interesting to pay attention to. If you can afford to spend $15 and
a few hours, find a way to enjoy it.

------
jandrewrogers
It is a quirk of American culture. In many parts of the world, society expects
people to be unremarkably average in some sense, and there isn't much room for
unfettered ambition. American culture, by contrast, has an expectation that
everyone can be exceptional and should strive for that, even though the
reality is that most people have little capacity to be exceptional in any
meaningful sense. I think attempting to live up to this standard of American
culture is the root cause of a lot of uniquely American stress. You even see
this difference in the startup cultures between the US and Europe. The flip
side is that in some sense I think Americans feel like they achieve self-
actualization more often.

I don't think you can change this part of American culture, it is deeply
embedded part of the American identity, and it does come with real benefits as
a society in addition to the obvious downsides. Individuals can choose to opt
out but there is always pressure to spurn that option.

------
andrewshatnyy
I moved to San Francisco from Russia and lived there for over 10 years.
Despite unstable life in Russia, with each year I was becoming increasingly
anxious whilst living in the States. Although I was making a bank, it felt
like I could loose it all any day if I’d became ill. I left that country less
than a year ago. It’s magical how exponentially happy and calm I am after
moving to Australia.

US is a country for people in their 20s who are either rage at EDM festivals
or those who busy building startups. There’s nothing to do if you poor or ill
- you fucked!

------
ridgewell
I wonder if the root cause for all of this is poor instruction on stress
management and anger management.

I am starting to wonder if many of these issues are actually culturally
driven, rather than biologically driven. American urban and industrial culture
as-a-whole is one that prizes productivity, grinding, and individual work,
rather than looser workdays, efficiency and teamwork.

I am aware there are exceptions.

~~~
enraged_camel
>>I wonder if the root cause for all of this is poor instruction on stress
management and anger management.

Do citizens of countries with low stress and anger levels receive such
instructions?

Because if not, lack of such instructions is unlikely to be the "root cause"
of the observed phenomenon.

~~~
ridgewell
Instruction on stress management and anger management is driven by parenting
and school environments, not by state-mandated education and mandatory stress
management workshops.

If you see your parents constantly on the verge of bankruptcy and lay-offs,
struggling to pay off medical bills and resorting to shouting as a stress
relief mechanism, then odds are, you'll grow up thinking this is the norm.

------
Reedx
I find the less news and social media I consume, the less stressed I am.

~~~
ASalazarMX
It's a strange balance between our desire to get informed and the need of the
media to monetize that desire.

------
war1025
I think the movie / book "Fight Club" does a good job of pointing out how
ridiculous American culture can be. Up until they go off the rails and start
bombing stuff, it's a really nice critique on society.

For example: "We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd
all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars, but we won't. And we're
slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

"Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can
buy shit we don't need. "

"We're consumers. We are the byproducts of a lifestyle obsession. Murder,
crime, poverty, these things don't concern me. What concerns me are celebrity
magazines, television with 500 channels, some guy's name on my underwear.
Rogaine, Viagra, Olestra."

America has a problem with raising people to have realistic expectations.
Whatever your parents' station in life, that's probably right about where
you'll end up. You can't be "anything" you want. People grind themselves into
the ground trying to be things they aren't.

~~~
chrisco255
That movie was made in the 90s, right? I think that culture has shifted some
since then and people are less obsessed with brand names. But maybe that
obsession has been replaced with looking good on social media?

~~~
rchaud
You bring up an interesting thing I noticed in the film (released in 1999
btw). There's a scene where Brad Pitt is on a bus and pointing to an ad of a
ripped Calvin Klein model and commenting to Edward Norton "As if that's what
real men look like".

And yet, what do people remember most about the film? Brad Pitt's shirtless
physique during fight scenes. Look up "Tyler Durden Fight Club fitness" on
Youtube. Tons of hits. People may conceptually understand that Fight Club is
satire, but their actions indicate otherwise. They want to have that kind of
body, even though they know it's not going to make them a movie star or a rock
god.

~~~
JBlue42
That's a good point about missing the satire and why movies like "Boiler
Room", "Wolf of Wall Street", etc can rub me the wrong way. Sure, there's a
fall and consequences after all the money and partying but that money and
partying looks pretty good (especially if you don't get caught).

~~~
rchaud
I didn't like WOWS for the reason you describe. They went completely over the
top with the party/drug/girls scenes, and you can tell the film is trying to
overtly glorify that kind of lifestyle, as opposed to showing the trappings of
that life. I got the same feeling I get when I see some random flexing on
Instagram. It felt fake.

Boiler Room on the other hand might have been a worse movie, but it had a low-
budget feel about it that at least grounded the characters and story within
some sense of reality. I think they were going for the Glengarry Glenross
aesthetic.

------
dfxm12
I wonder where these negative experiences are coming from. What are people
stressed about? Is it money? Certainly, but would that explain the recent
rise? People have been poor in the US for a while.

Maybe it comes from the news, both real and fake.

    
    
      Only in America   
      could you find a way to make a healthy buck  
      and still keep your attitude on self destruct.  

-MF DOOM [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQnjNOWd1sI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQnjNOWd1sI)

------
tomschlick
>The findings were not all bleak for the United States. Despite having
widespread negative experiences, Americans also generally reported more
positive experiences, on average, than the rest of the world did.

So we have both. But that isn't in the headline because it wouldn't be
clickbaity enough.

I honestly wonder how much of American's stress over the past few years is
because of this crap. We are constantly told the sky is falling by new
articles only to have it not be the truth.

~~~
andbberger
The sky is definitely falling. Maybe you should talk to more poor people

~~~
pard68
Generally speaking the poor report better mental health than the wealth.
Anecdotally I also have to say my neighbors are much more jovial and
optimistic than the wealthy people I interact with (I live in a very low
income area). Should be noted my experiences are probably skewed towards
optimistic as I live in a very religious area and generally speaking religious
folk are more optimistic than secular folk.

~~~
fLflLflFlfl
What is "better mental health" in this context? It's pretty well established
that rates of mental health issues are greater among those below the poverty
line - see, for example, these data from 2015:
[https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/report_2720/...](https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/report_2720/Spotlight-2720.html)

If you're talking about general "level of happiness", there is evidence for
the "money doesn't buy happiness" meme, but that is more the product of the
hedonic treadmill than anything else. Our brains are good at convincing us
that our current situation is okay, but that doesn't mean that poverty doesn't
have very real effects on the basic services needed to function in our
society.

------
istorical
Simultaneously lacking in the pro-relaxation/mental health benefits of both
the developing world (importance of family and extended family, close-knit
community structures) and the developed world (social welfare, healthcare
safety net - people don't go uninsured and risk bankruptcy or avoid doctors
due to potential bills in other developed countries).

The USA is a great place to try to become wealthy but a terrible place to be
poor.

------
i_don_t_know
When I was living in the US, the thing I hated the most and that stressed me
out the most was that I had to drive everywhere. You can't walk places. Well,
you can but it's not fun. And no decent public transport. No bike lanes (well
a few but you still had to ride on roads without any).

I have never owned a car in Germany. I can walk to a supermarket or a bakery.
I find it so much more pleasant than having to drive everywhere.

~~~
andrewla
Your scope might be too broad; the US is a large place. Germany is not so
small either. In many cities in the US cars are not a necessity and public
transit is adequate.

~~~
stuxnet79
Apart from the big transit-friendly metro areas like New York and Chicago,
where else will you not be penalized for being carless?

Even in Chicago, I often feel like the city is giving me a middle finger for
not owning a car ... Urban planning and zoning regulations in the US as a
whole favor cars over pedestrians.

------
Arubis
At the risk of being flippant: they needed a poll for this?

Reader, reflect on the society in which you live, and ask yourself: if
something really crappy happened to your family out of the blue, would someone
catch you when you fall?

~~~
stagger87
So you're suggesting rather than sourcing the poll for the article they should
source their feelings?

------
akeck
A common cause of stress for people I know is getting and paying for
healthcare.

------
jfk13
I wonder how much the stress level would change if Americans had a tax-funded
universal healthcare system?

~~~
EliRivers
I certainly know people who stay in jobs they hate because they fear going
without medical cover for self and family; in contrast, over six jobs in 18
years, I've only once lined up a job before quitting and the idea of having to
keep a job for the medical insurance sounds like bondage to me (yes, I know,
it's not bondage, it's all just relative - that's what it sounds like _to me_
). Being able to simply quit (and sometimes just knowing it's a genuine
option) when I get sick of work has, I suspect, contributed to my mental
health.

I've seen people keep jobs they hate because they need to keep providing for
their family. In the worst cases, they come to resent those very same loved
ones for what they have to go through on a daily basis. It's not healthy for
anyone involved.

------
bayareanative
Opioid crisis, crushing debt, taking away healthcare from the poor to give to
the rich (literally killing people for money) and bankruptcies from healthcare
costs and lopsided divorce arrangements. Because of wealth capture of the
political process and media, America is simultaneously a paradise for the rich
and crushing austerity and wage-slavery for the poor. There's people living
rough on the sides of highway embankments because they can't afford housing
and killing themselves quickly with opioids because their futures seem so
wretched and bleak. It's a third-world country, while many Americans think
everything's "great."

------
throwayEngineer
I've noticed many of my peers claim to be Busy.

I know it's impossible to be productive all day... But I'm curious if these
are Americans who claim Stress.

They might be stressed and busy, but these are also my peers with awful time
management and make bad Decisions.

I believe the stress is self imposed and optional.

------
codegeek
I have a theory for this. I am a capitalist but I do believe that America has
a real wage growth problem for majority of Americans especially on the lower
end of income spectrum [0]. Things have changed where now even though people
make more money monetarily, the actual purchasing power is much lower. So now,
most American families have both spouses working and of course single income
households are only by force and not by choice for most middle class/poor
Americans. Not to mention the stress of things like healthcare costs, it
really adds up to the stress that I would argue most other developed nations
don't have.

So I really think that we need a Capitalistic society with social programs
that provide the basic needs to EVERY american. For basic needs, we should not
compete with each other. We should only compete for innovation and creativity.
I want every American to be able to eat, sleep in a decent place and not worry
about healthcare. If that can be taken care of, let them excel if they can in
whatever they want to excel at.

[0] [https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-
us...](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-
real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/)

------
kvhdude
are the countries being bombed in various wars excluded? I always wonder about
their stress levels and coping techniques. Here high school stress is leading
to depression epidemic.

~~~
BeetleB
The better (safer, healthier, whatever) a society gets, the greater the impact
of any problem (inequity, health, etc) on the people, and the more sensitive
they become. It's not at all a given that people in countries that are
chronically worse off have more negativity.

Personal example: Lived in a country where corporal punishment of 2 years old
is the norm. I didn't like it, but seeing it happen didn't negatively affect
me much. Then lived in a country where it was definitely not the norm, and
highly discouraged. A decade later, seeing someone slap a 2 year old is
definitely invokes a strong negative reaction from me. I'm pretty sure that
were I to move back to the first country, within a year it wouldn't.

Example on a wider scale: The level of outrage, fear, and paranoia when
someone in the US gets measles. Go live in a country where it's more common,
and getting measles is viewed as merely an annoyance. That it is the leading
cause of vaccine-preventable death isn't enough to justify the extremes of
vitriol I see in the US. At the end of the day, far too many things in the US
cause more deaths. We don't call fines and imprisonment for parents who allow
their kids to become obese (well, _most_ of us don't).

From some people's perspective, this is also at play with the concept of safe
spaces in colleges, _perceived_ microaggressions[0], etc. The US has generally
gotten more polite in the last few decades, so there is less tolerance for
anything that is not perceived as being polite. And if someone is less polite,
it has to be explained by a narrative. The concept that people are simply rude
is eroding. Instead, they must be racists, misogynists, homophobes,
nationalist, etc.

Science and technology do wonders for physical health and physical quality of
life. Unfortunately, countries like the US focus a lot more on those without
focusing on the required mental perspectives that need to go along with it.
You're simply not going to improve people's perceptions of how well they are
doing without addressing psychological factors. Not to get too philosophical,
but most of a person's sense of suffering is generated by the narrative the
person is telling him/herself. In a different country, when someone catches
measles, it's "Pity." Or even "Thank goodness he'll get it out of his system
and be immune" (which was the mentality when I was growing up). Over here,
it's "X should go to jail for refusing to vaccinate the kid!" That mentality
will no doubt reduce the amount of measles in a given society, but it is _not_
going to improve the society's mental well being. Other strategies are needed.

[0] I say perceived, because it is often invoked for behavior that has little
to do with what you see on the Wiki page for microaggressions - in my work
place we've been taught that appearing distracted while someone is talking to
you is a microaggression, for example.

~~~
stuxnet79
> You're simply not going to improve people's perceptions of how well they are
> doing without addressing psychological factors. Not to get too
> philosophical, but most of a person's sense of suffering is generated by the
> narrative the person is telling him/herself.

I spent my formative years in both a poor, poverty-stricken country and a rich
first-world country. I couldn't agree with this more.

You'd think that a more affluent society would result in healthier, happier
people but it really doesn't ... there are so many psychological factors that
come into play.

~~~
BeetleB
Frankly, you don't even need to compare richer vs poorer countries. Just
compare today's generation with older generations.

My father was significantly older than me. He didn't have electricity early in
his life. He didn't have comforts like an electric fan till he was in his
teens. He could afford air conditioners only when he was in his 40's. When he
was younger, smallpox was a constant presence in society (measles is nothing
in comparison). He went from being close to food insecurity to not having to
worry about food and shelter. I could make a really long list.

Now while in general he was a content person, at times it was clear that all
these gains (with the possible exception of not having to worry about food and
shelter) played little role in his mental happiness. As society progressed,
the reference points all got reset.

This isn't all that different from comparing rich with poor societies. If even
in a rich society you find that all these gains (which even the poor in
society benefited from) haven't made a big impact on one's mental happiness,
one shouldn't expect the same when comparing rich with poor societies.

------
ummonk
I wonder how it compares to even more workaholic countries like Japan or South
Korea.

------
RickJWagner
Yes, of course.

Americans currently have record low unemployment (especially for minorities),
rising wages, a roaring stock market and fewer race riots than when the
previous president was in office.

So for some, it is not a stressful time.

------
anotherthro313
Duh. All you have to do is fly from New York to Copenhagen and back to
understand how angry and stressed we are, as well as what kind of life would
be possible if our nation put caring about everybody's quality of life above
power and greed.

~~~
cpursley
Visiting Denmark (and Finland, Sweden, Netherlands) is what it took to make me
realize we're (USA) doing it wrong. Those places just feel... low stress, safe
and normal.

------
spaceheretostay
> When Gallup investigated the responses more closely, it found that being
> under 50, earning a low income and having a dim view of President Trump’s
> job performance were correlated with negative experiences among adults in
> the United States.

> But there still isn’t enough data to say for sure whether any of those
> factors were behind the feelings of stress, worry and anger.

> “We are seeing patterns that would point to a political explanation, or a
> polarization explanation, with the U.S. data, but can we say that
> definitively? No,” Ms. Ray said.

The United States is under attack from Russia. We are involved in a propaganda
war, a real physical war attacking our election infrastructure, and the
President encourages it to continue while cutting/removing our ability to
secure our elections and defend our democracy. He states that he is intent on
not leaving office peacefully in the future and that he likes China's one-
party for life.

I get that this may not be conclusively proven to increase stress on
Americans, but I would be _shocked_ if it were not a major contributing
factor. Every single person I've spoken to IRL about the Trump-related-stress-
and-depression concept eagerly agrees that this is weighing heavily on people
in a very constant, deep and personal way.

Obviously, personal finances, job security, and other close things are likely
equally or more important. But Trump has also eliminated many people's
feelings of financial security or job security, as he has personally chosen to
hold paychecks from a million people on a racist vendetta, directly removing
those people's personal income while still demanding they work.

Surely it can be said that at least for some large portion of Americans, it is
true that Trump's policies and behavior on the job _Are_ hurting us.

~~~
iron0013
What you said is so mild compared to the rhetoric deployed by right-wing HN
commenters every day--few of whom get the same reprimand from the mods that
you just got.

~~~
sctb
We don't see nearly everything—not even close. Please help us by flagging such
inappropriate comments or emailing hn@ycombinator.com.

~~~
iron0013
Will do, thank you.

------
malvosenior
_" When Gallup investigated the responses more closely, it found that being
under 50, earning a low income and having a dim view of President Trump’s job
performance were correlated with negative experiences among adults in the
United States."_

I'm sure the media plays a huge part in this. Realistically speaking,
American's lives are practically no different than before Trump was elected,
yet almost all major media outlets produce Trump-centric outrage bait every
day. If people actually looked at their own personal experiences vs what the
media tells them to think about, they would probably be a lot less stressed
out (about that issue in particular). The New York Times is ironically one of
the top purveyors of Trump flavored stress.

~~~
ClutchBand
Blaming a temporary administration for the problem gives them a new enemy
every cycle, keeping you distracted from the larger issues and problems.

~~~
codingdave
The administration may be temporary, but they have control of our military,
our weapons, and our international policy. They have influence over slow-
moving change in the country, and direct impact on faster changes via
executive orders.

Yes, there are are deep systemic issues that go beyond the temporary
leadership, and yes, those are important. But that doesn't mean the leadership
should not be a concern of ours.

