Slouching Towards Oblivion

Showing posts with label USA vs The World. Show all posts
Showing posts with label USA vs The World. Show all posts

Thursday, September 10, 2020

By The Numbers

Social Progress Index

"Highlights":
  • USAmerica Inc is #1 in Quality Of University Education, but we're #91 in Access To Quality Basic Education
  • USAmerica Inc is #1 in Medical Technologies, but we're #97 in Access To Quality Healthcare
Get the picture?


Here's a cheery little stick bomb from Nick Christof at NYT:

This should be a wake-up call: New data suggest that the United States is one of just a few countries worldwide that is slipping backward.

The newest Social Progress Index, shared with me before its official release Thursday morning, finds that out of 163 countries assessed worldwide, the United States, Brazil and Hungary are the only ones in which people are worse off than when the index began in 2011. And the declines in Brazil and Hungary were smaller than America’s.

“The data paint an alarming picture of the state of our nation, and we hope it will be a call to action,” Michael Porter, a Harvard Business School professor and the chair of the advisory panel for the Social Progress Index, told me. “It’s like we’re a developing country.”

The index, inspired by research of Nobel-winning economists, collects 50 metrics of well-being — nutrition, safety, freedom, the environment, health, education and more — to measure quality of life. Norway comes out on top in the 2020 edition, followed by Denmark, Finland and New Zealand. South Sudan is at the bottom, with Chad, Central African Republic and Eritrea just behind.

The United States, despite its immense wealth, military power and cultural influence, ranks 28th — having slipped from 19th in 2011. The index now puts the United States behind significantly poorer countries, including Estonia, Czech Republic, Cyprus and Greece.

“We are no longer the country we like to think we are,” said Porter.

The United States ranks No. 1 in the world in quality of universities, but No. 91 in access to quality basic education. The U.S. leads the world in medical technology, yet we are No. 97 in access to quality health care.

The Social Progress Index finds that Americans have health statistics similar to those of people in Chile, Jordan and Albania, while kids in the United States get an education roughly on par with what children get in Uzbekistan and Mongolia. A majority of countries have lower homicide rates, and most other advanced countries have lower traffic fatality rates and better sanitation and internet access.

The United States has high levels of early marriage — most states still allow child marriage in some circumstances — and lags in sharing political power equally among all citizens. America ranks a shameful No. 100 in discrimination against minorities.

The data for the latest index predates Covid-19, which has had a disproportionate impact on the United States and seems likely to exacerbate the slide in America’s standing. One new study suggests that in the United States, symptoms of depression have risen threefold since the pandemic began — and poor mental health is associated with other risk factors for well-being.

Michael Green, the C.E.O. of the group that puts out the Social Progress Index, notes that the coronavirus will affect health, longevity and education, with the impact particularly large in both the United States and Brazil. The equity and inclusiveness measured by the index seem to help protect societies from the virus, he said.

“Societies that are inclusive, tolerant and better educated are better able to manage the pandemic,” Green said.

The decline of the United States over the last decade in this index — more than any country in the world — is a reminder that we Americans face structural problems that predate President Trump and that festered under leaders of both parties. Trump is a symptom of this larger malaise, and also a cause of its acceleration.

David G. Blanchflower, a Dartmouth economist, has new research showing that the share of Americans reporting in effect that every day is a bad mental health day has doubled over 25 years. “Rising distress and despair are largely American phenomenon not observed in other advanced countries,” Blanchflower told me.

This decline is deeply personal for me: As I’ve written, a quarter of the kids on my old No. 6 school bus in rural Oregon are now dead from drugs, alcohol and suicide — what are called “deaths of despair.” I lost one friend to a heroin overdose this spring and have had more friends incarcerated than I could possibly count; the problems are now self-replicating in the next generation because of the dysfunction in some homes.

You as taxpayers paid huge sums to imprison my old friends; the money would have been far better invested educating them, honing their job skills or treating their addictions.

That’s why this is an election like that of 1932. That was the year American voters decisively rejected Herbert Hoover’s passivity and gave Franklin Roosevelt an electoral mandate — including a flipped Senate — that laid the groundwork for the New Deal and the modern middle class. But first we need to acknowledge the reality that we are on the wrong track.

We Americans like to say “We’re No. 1.” But the new data suggest that we should be chanting, “We’re No. 28! And dropping!”

Let’s wake up, for we are no longer the country we think we are.

Wednesday, January 24, 2018

America 8th!

Well now - that don't scan for shit, does it?


The Hill:

A Gallup poll recently found that global approval of U.S. leadership sank to its lowest point in nearly two decades during President Trump’s first year in office.

The U.S. has also dropped significantly in the U.S. News rankings of trustworthiness and political stability. The greatest U.S. decline was in rankings of countries having open travel policies, likely related to Trump’s attempts to block visitors to the U.S. via the travel ban.

Monday, July 11, 2016

Resistance Is Life

The whole thing from Juan Cole:
Kurdish Women Fighting ISIL Send Solidarity to BlackLivesMatter
“You are among the most radical voices in today’s racist, sexist, capitalist world,” the YPJ wrote to Black Lives Matter.
Fighters from the Kurdish Women’s Defense Units or YPJ, have sent a message of solidarity to the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States.
“To our black sisters and brothers! The people of Kurdistan stand with you!” read the short statement posted Saturday by the group, who has been fighting the incursions of ISIS [Daesh] in northern Syria for close to two years. “Here are the women who fight ISIS in Rojava (northern Syria) – saluting your honorable struggle for freedom, dignity, and resistance!”
The call for Black Lives Matter has become a focal point for discussions around systemic racism and police brutality following the police killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner in 2014, as well as numerous other incidents since. This past week, police killed Philando Castille and Alton Sterling – both incidents filmed and subsequently shared ober social media – touching off more protests across the United States.
For the women of the YPJ, solidarity and building “world revolution” against racism, sexism and capitalism, go hand in hand.
“As the women in Kurdistan know very well, we need to build our self-defense in all spheres of life. You are among the most radical voices in today’s racist, sexist, capitalist world and the freedom-loving peoples of the world deeply respect and salute your fight! Solidarity is the first step to world revolution!,” the statement continued.
Since the most recent string of high-profile U.S.police shootings of Blackpeople, expressions of solidarity from other communities in the United States as well as groups from around the world have been pouring in – with the radical, communist Kurdish groups being the latest.
“Black Lives Matter! As we say in Kurdish: “Berxwedan jiyan e!” – Resistance is life!,” the YPJgroup concluded.
Via TeleSur
I guess I'd worry a little about backlash because of a ringing endorsement from a group that espouses "communism" - if I thought anybody was gonna pay any real attention to it anyway.

We seem to think we can rule the world without actually having to live in it.

Tuesday, May 03, 2016

Dude - Chill


First - somebody needs to be a little more careful about keepin' that guy away from the coffee. Jesus - it's like grandma's Chihuahua got into the Aderall.

And I'd dearly love it if the Zombie Lie of "the surge worked" could be laid to rest.

Three things about "the surge worked" that even I know:
  1. The sheiks started to get pretty reasonable about not fighting us when we started to pay them to stop fighting us, because...
  2. The sheiks realized we were telling them we'd fuck off and leave 'em alone if they cooled it long enough to let us pretend we'd won the thing
  3. The propaganda of "The Surge Worked" is what worked.
This guy is doing the classic Deflecting Denialism thing - "our policy didn't fail; we failed to carry through on the policy..."

And it ends up being: "Iraqis are still fighting back and killing Americans, so obviously, we haven't killed enough Iraqis - let's go kill some more Iraqis".

And so, secondly - how many times do we need to learn the same lesson?  You don't kill your way to a solution for political problems.

People have been trying this same shit forever.  It's partly the lesson of The Greater Fool - "I will prevail where others have failed" - and that's all well and good, Skeezix, but ya gotta remember that better people than you have been trying to conquer the world for a solid 40,000 years at last count, and guess what - the world remains undefeated.

So knock that shit off.

Thursday, April 03, 2014

Social Progress

And the hits just keep comin'.

Via Nicholas Kristof at NYT:
In the Social Progress Index, the United States excels in access to advanced education but ranks 70th in health, 69th in ecosystem sustainability, 39th in basic education, 34th in access to water and sanitation and 31st in personal safety. Even in access to cellphones and the Internet, the United States ranks a disappointing 23rd, partly because one American in five lacks Internet access.
“It’s astonishing that for a country that has Silicon Valley, lack of access to information is a red flag,” notes Michael Green, executive director of the Social Progress Imperative, which oversees the index. The United States has done better at investing in drones than in children, and cuts in social services could fray the social fabric further.
--and--
Over all, the United States’ economy outperformed France’s between 1975 and 2006. But 99 percent of the French population actually enjoyed more gains in that period than 99 percent of the American population. Exclude the top 1 percent, and the average French citizen did better than the average American. This lack of shared prosperity and opportunity has stunted our social progress.
You can play with the charts and maps by going to the Social Progress Index website.

Have fun - Mediocrity Uber Alles!

hat tip = FB friend DR