The FT posted a pretty amazing graph Americans basically die earlier than Brits by about 5 years, and it’s there along all income distributions. An average American lives the same length life as a Brit from the most deprived parts of the UK. The reason given is early death -One in 25 American five-year-o... lewism.org

@lewism That's grimly impressive. Do they suggest reasons?

@lukemperez & @JohnBrady deaths while young…drugs, guns, road deaths. If you make it to middle age you have same life expectancy it seems.

@lewism @JohnBrady Thanks. Tracks with my priors. Common parlance, we have more freedoms—which includes, unfortunately, the freedom to destroy yourself. I have more than handful of classmates from high school who died before 40. (I’m not yet 45.)

@lukemperez @JohnBrady I basically agree though I would like to push back a little on the word 'freedom' used I think here to cover for a bunch of other stuff that would need unpacking. You are after all also breaking the law in the U.S for shooting kids in a school or shooting up in the parking lot or negligently running over someone. It's more like protection/ unprotection a feature of state & culture. Maybe I'm being too pedantic I don't know.