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I'd bet dollars to donuts that the decoupling of gains in productivity and increases wages (productivity outstripping wage increase) correlates to increases in anxiety and depression. Our mental health crisis is rooted in economic policy. nytimes.com/interactive/20…
The human cost is tremendous, and so is the economic cost. Depriving more Americans every year of a living wage or increase in their wages is putting great strain on the economy in many areas.
Yes, wealthier folks are also seeing an increase in anxiety and depression, but this is why I believe it's a combination of "scarcity and precarity." Poorer folks experience scarcity, harming mental AND physical health. Richer folks experience precarity, which harms mental health
Poorer folks are seeing decreases their longevity, while richer folks' longevity is increasing, but even the relatively wealthy can't escape of the anxiety of feeling financially precarious, which is why they also have increases in anxiety and depression. vox.com/science-and-he…
Some wealthier folks are likely more secure economically than they feel, but the existence of the precariat below them is a constant reminder that they too could lose their position. This is why the paranoid parenting takes hold among the wealthier. They fear for kids' futures.
If I was David Brooks, I'd be blaming all this on a moral malaise, but there is no cure where people pull themselves up by their mental health bootstraps. If you either are, or perceive that you are being crushed by economic forces out of your control, of course you're anxious.
Our great moral scolds like Brooks will never grapple with this.
The bottom line of the U.S. Treasury will be aided by policies like $15 minimum wage, free college, single-payer because people will live in an atmosphere where they are more likely to thrive and yes, be productive. Give me a New York Times column.
Sidebar to the tenured of academia. All those adjuncts are harming your own well-being, not only by requiring you to do more service work because your numbers a smaller, but because they are a constant reminder of the precarity of your position, even if you're tenured.
So-called fiscal conservatives who want to shrink the federal budget should support policies like the $15 minimum wage. It will relieve at least some of the strain on government services.
