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Thursday, October 15, 2015

The Healthy Live Longer

Some things are axiomatic. My customers occasionally and tangentially touch upon such things in the Tavern while discussing other matters. But the media in Hillary's Village all too often insist on putting their own strange 'spin' on even the most clear-cut matters in order to sell the Narrative.

Wealth is a favourite bogyman. The 'gap' between the Rich and the Poor. Almost to a template, the media will sell the idea that Inequality is a 'Bad Thing' like rain or women having babies.  There are other factors, of course, which may even be spoken about - even focused upon - but not before the money aspect has been raised.

Money is the 'causal' issue, always. Income isn't equal. And it isn't 'fair'. And it is rich people's fault. So it always seems.

This came up today.

Unsuprisingly, no-one put their name to it. I would not either.
New York is a city of Extreme Inequality 
...where people in the poorest neighbourhood of Brooklyn die 11 years earlier than those living around Wall Street, according to new data.
The city unveiled health statistics from across Brooklyn, one of New York’s five boroughs, that seek to provide the most reliable indicator of community health in a decade.
So, the headline compares a 'poor' place with the centre of the business world. Hello! I swear that one day we shall read that under-fives have no freedom and little income compared to 45 year olds and that this is unfair. 
Updating and expanding the statistics, officials hope, will highlight extreme inequality in America’s largest city and help to improve quality of life for the poorest.
Look, I don't want to put it too harshly, but if ''Inequality' is the main issue for the Headliners, would it help to even things up - make us all less 'unequal' - if we all became poor and all lived in squalor?  

Whoops. I think the socialists have that one covered already.
In Brooklyn’s poorest neighbourhood of Brownsville, which has a majority black population of 76 per cent, average life expectancy is 74.1 years — among the lowest in the city.
Manhattan’s financial district, home to Wall Street, has the highest life expectancy in the city — at 85.4 years it is a staggering 11 years longer than in Brownsville.

Not that a lot of folk actually live on Wall St. Most commute in from a long way off and some even fly to get there. But heck,.... 
The data was last updated in 2006, making it the first time in 10 years that indicators have been reviewed and improved.
Indicators include smoking, obesity, diabetes and drug use, as well as others not previously included that influence health such as air pollution, and quality of local housing and shops.
“Poor health outcomes tend to cluster in places that people of colour call home and where many residents live in poverty,” said New York City health commissioner Mary Bassett.
Er.... live in poverty. Yes. And why is that do you think? Ahhh, because they don't have money like rich people do. Duh ! 
Residents in Brownsville were not dying 11 years earlier from unusual causes but from “the same diseases — mostly heart disease and cancer — at younger age and at higher rates.”
Let us not mention that Brownsville has a LOT more green-space than Wall St.
Among the 86,377 people living in Brownsville, more than 25 per cent of adults have not finished high school and nearly 40 per cent live below the federal poverty level.
Not that education has anything to do with income, especially with 'Common Core'. 
It is the poorest neighbourhood in Brooklyn and the seventh poorest in New York, which includes four other boroughs — Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens and Staten Island. 
Brownsville suffers more than twice the citywide rates of new HIV diagnoses, at 66 per 100,000 inhabitants compared to 30.4.
Ah, yes. That must be down to income inequality. 
Its rate of psychiatric hospitalisations is also more than twice the city rate at 1727 per 100,000 adults compared to 684.
That too.
Other districts in Manhattan and Queens mimic the longer life expectancy of the financial district, while three other areas of Brooklyn and the Bronx cluster with Brownsville at the bottom.
Remaining health profiles for the rest of New York will be released borough by borough over the coming weeks.
I wonder  - as the writer and the burghers of New York seem not to - if the lack of income is more due to the  other factors discussed so briefly. The lack of education; the higher buggery rate (oh dear, the UN will be onto me now) and drug dealers on every corner, and the loonies that congregate.  They did not even get around to comparing single-mother households. 

Would the writer be happier if Wall St had the same levels? More 'equal'?

And one other they always seem to overlook. Perhaps it has something to do with voting choices too. 

Just thinking aloud.

I mean, just look at Chicago ! Look at Detroit! 

They have a lot of green-spaces too !

Guess which Political Party consistently gets the votes there.

Meanwhile Brownsville residents are tacking the problems in the time-honoured Conservative way. They are getting on their bikes.



That is if they can only get the rich folk to cough up to build them some bike lanes. 

Yes, they want Bike Lanes !!  

The 'unofficial Mayor', has been gathering the gang to make a few demands of dem rich folk in da street, man.


Who would they turn to if there were no rich people? Heck, not even middling taxpayers working 8-6. 

It is high time this 'Inequality' whine was kicked to the curb along with the drugs, the welfare dependancy, the woeful education, the gay plague, fatherlessness and socialism. 

We would all live longer and better if we all developed healthy minds to go with healthy bodies. But that would require a healthy body-politic.


Pax.



5 comments:

  1. Now I may surprise you in agreement, in some ways, but in others,perhaps you'll find what I have to say typical of a "left leaner"? ;)

    I actually vehemently disagree with Hillary and Bernie on more taxation of private wealthy citizens - I don't think anyone should have to pay anyone else's way just because they make a greater income.

    However, I do agree with them that wealthy corporations and their lobbyists have too much power and control over governmental decisions that are supposed to be made by elected officials that we the people voted for, the majority of us not being in the wealthy category (here in the US).

    Corporations stimulate our economy and make a profit, and there's nothing wrong with that and they shouldn't be penalized for doing so; however, doing so should not mean they get special influence and privileges, either.

    Business focus is on how to make a profit. They're not service-oriented like most of the rest of us are as teachers, cops, military, social workers - they have no idea what's best for the rest of us because that is not their area of expertise. So though they should be represented in our government, they shouldn't be in control of it, just because they've made more profit than most of us. Does that make sense?

    I also have to say that though I don't agree with Bernie Sanders' methodology, I do agree that there is no reason that a person working 40 hours a week is ever at poverty income level is still at poverty level in the United States and therefore has to go on food stamps, but there are 1000s in this situation. So the responsibility for that then falls not on either the individual nor the government, but then on corporate pay.

    IMO, the minimum wage in the US should be increased because businesses have been taking advantage of their employees and job shortage since the economy collapsed, not raising employee wage to a level that accommodates even the minimal amount it would take to support a single person alone.

    I do understand smaller businesses struggling on this idea and trying to survive, I do, but there's just no good reason larger corporations can't consider the minimal cost of living for a certain area versus the pay at this point, with many of these larger corporations now reporting record profits.

    As far as Detroit and Chicago, greed, government ineptitude and corruption does exist in our government, but it's not exclusive to either the left or right - especially in my neck of the woods it's been very bipartisan. But unfortunately the only police we have to stop these things are our government and justice system.

    Just a couple of "gray area" distinctions that I personally make, maybe you don't agree, feel free to share or perhaps present things I haven't yet considered on these issues, I'm listening :)

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    1. All worthy points. A balance has to be struck, certainly. But our elected representatives are the problem, not the solution, as they do not represent us (major terminalogical inexactitude #1 ) and they buy their elected role rather than earning it.(#2). Minimum wage is not a solution that has worked anywhere at any time. The young, in their first job, are the natural minimum wage earners and frankly most are not worth that enforced minimum. Older people with families have no business competing with them but are encouraged to by inflated pay for jobs that have little skill demand. I will let others counter the 'Big Business' points and here only say that big businesses are owned by millions of shareholders (through insurance and superannuation) who care not a whit what the managers do. They should and can, but don't. The 'profits' earned by businesses big and small are the 'left-overs' after all costs are paid. The biggest 'cost' for most businesses is wages. Even in minimum wage job businesses.

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    2. Amen on the first 2 sentences :)

      On the minimum wage, perhaps more balance is needed there, too. Because as you say, paying everyone (old vs. young, lazy vs. industrious) the same wage for the same job is a poor motivator for productivity, but then I also think paying everyone too low for a task is a poor motivator for productivity, too.

      What do you think of outsourcing, out of curiousity?

      Just a quick background scenario, I work in a field that is unregulated by the government at all because we work at home and are paid based on productivity, by the line we type. It's a lot more skilled than people think, you have to be well-versed in medical terminology, pharmaceuticals and medical equipment, as well as listen well, "interpret" languages, accents and where you think the doc is trying to go/what he's trying to say correctly, especially when doctors like to hold their mouths entirely too close to the receiver and dictate open-heart surgeries while eating nachos with a crying baby in the background and beeping of various machinery.

      And you have to be smart enough to know the doc gets paid based on what you type and if he or you did not substantiate the need for this surgery and what was done/happened during the surgery enough for billing, insurance companies will not pay them, as well as catch and flag things that may affect patient care. (Doc said the surgery was on the right leg in the first paragraph, but left in the second - that could be bad, yes :)

      However, when they began outsourcing us to India in 2006, our line price dropped to 8 cents a line, then 6, in some places it's now 3. It didn't matter how good or fast you were, we were competing with India who charged 3 cents a line.

      Then voice recognition came in and we became editors rather than transcriptionists. We basically had the same monetary value as Indian labor for a while and though we were making now 3 cents a line (less than minimum wage for 8 hours of work), we were still demanded perfection in quality.

      (This is why I care less about quick blurbs in my personal typing, my quality is reserved for my job and I work on productivity, so I type fast and go and get back to work;)

      Luckily, India hasn't worked out so well these companies. Nothing against them trying to survive on that wage, but it is easier to survive on that wage in India than it is in the US. And though they were cheap but English was not their first language, so there were many errors and many nonpayments by insurance companies because of it. The same for voice recognition, we just aren't there yet.

      Then in 2010, the federal government mandated EHR which made doctors enter their own information, and believe me, that didn't work out for them either as far as time and spelling and word choice errors! (tee hee :)

      So as of last year, holding on by the skin of our teeth - we're back, typing straight into EHR for a good wage:)

      For a while, we were literally slave labor and nobody could do anything about it and we felt lucky to have a job at all and took a lot of stuff that really, no one should take on a job, but we did it because we needed it and just worked 14-16 hours a day just to make minimum wage or worked 2 and 3 jobs as I did.

      So I get and appreciate the idea of market value for a job, but outsourcing changed those rules to unfair levels, see what I mean?

      Well, even if not, thank you for discussing this with me like the reasonable man I know you to actually be ;)

      I saw your request for discussion elsewhere and I replied, but I'm not sure my comment will make the cut so if you'd ever like to open that discussion here, I'm game. For now I'll drop it in your contact box, hope that's okay.

      Have a good weekend :)

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  2. There are, of course, green spaces and green spaces. There are the USSR type green spaces we see in the pic and then there are our sort of green spaces.

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The Tavern gets rowdy visitors from time to time. Some are brain dead and some soul dead. They attack customers and the bar staff and piss on the carpets. Those people will not be allowed in anymore. So... Be Nice..