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For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

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Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#201

Post by sysbin »

notadoc wrote: post #103
codingslave wrote: post #12

Really doubt this. Instead I would look into the connection between anti depressants/anti psychotics and suicide. There's research of strong connections, but immunity is claimed by the drug companies, "because they were already depressed/mentally unhealthy when put on the drugs". Mental health professionals and managers at large drug companies need to start going to jail for over-prescribing psychiatric drugs. The ne…

> Stemming the flow of cheap fentanyl dumped into the United States by China OK, and how's the "war on drugs" going thus far? > Mental health professionals and managers at large drug companies need to start going to jail for over-prescribing psychiatric drugs. Really? You want to put people into jail for trying to treat depression? > throwing doctors in jail who over prescribe these drugs would do wonders for people.…

I'm doubtful the discussion will go anywhere productive but I think part of your argument is an assumption, "And now you want to imprison doctors for treating pain and taking care of patients?" because filling a role of a job to just prescribe medication isn't really trying and when we don't actually know what the outcome will be. Following a protocol isn't really trying is all.

Research from the past few years has been questioning if the brain will just adapt overtime while on medication to the point of becoming oversensitive when off the medication and where the normal state of the person gets worse. I've only read this about antipsychotics more so than antidepressants.

In any case much if not all research in the topic of mind altering medication is still in the infant years and should be read while being skeptic. Multiple unique life factors can make research very difficult to get right in this topic.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#202

Post by are-you-sure »

claudeganon wrote: post #91
emptybits wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re/ medicare for all ... Canada has universal health care yet a very similar suicide rate to the USA.[1] Canada doesn't have a livable minimum wage either. Each province sets its own. There is talk of UBI experiments. [1] https://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2011/02/us-vs-can...

But by contrast, the UK and it’s NHS has almost half the rate of the US.

Where are you getting your facts from? The UK has a higher than global average, with some demographics tragically high.

UK – 11.2 per 100,000 people – in 2018 (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/sep/03/suicides-rat... & https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsde...). I think the UK's Office of National Statistics is a better source of information that Wikipedia.

UBI is a great idea. Unfortunately, minimum wage now usually means "in work" poverty, that's not a good thing.

edit: @0000011111, I think income inequality could certainly be a driver.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#203

Post by selrumingo »

luckydata wrote: post #182
pkaye wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nearly a 2x difference in rate between white and native americans vs blacks, asians and hispanics. I'm wondering if there is a good understanding of that difference. I don't think it is just economic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_in_the_United_States#/...

Because if you're told you're supposed to "make it" since birth, and you don't, you feel like a piece of shit. Marginalized communities have been told the other story, every little thing is a win. Difference in expectations is huge, and source of all sort of bad things (like racial resentment etc...). Solution: make this country slightly less "dog eat dog" and you'll solve a LOT of social issues almost overnight.

It’s not just about expectations of yourself. It might even be more about others’ expectations of you.

When society says your white privilege means you have no excuse for failure, that is a hard dead end.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#204

Post by tunesmith »

sp332 wrote: post #168
tunesmith wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's interesting because... right now we have a system that examines income and taxes income. The "wealth tax" is a system that examines wealth and taxes wealth (not income). It's theorized that it's unconstitutional, and even if it isn't, the conservative US court might cause it problems anyway. But if instead you examine wealth and tax income , maybe that gets around the issue. Higher income tax brackets for thos…

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(yes, thank you - faulty synapse, edited.)

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#205

Post by rayiner »

luckydata wrote: post #182
pkaye wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nearly a 2x difference in rate between white and native americans vs blacks, asians and hispanics. I'm wondering if there is a good understanding of that difference. I don't think it is just economic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_in_the_United_States#/...

Because if you're told you're supposed to "make it" since birth, and you don't, you feel like a piece of shit. Marginalized communities have been told the other story, every little thing is a win. Difference in expectations is huge, and source of all sort of bad things (like racial resentment etc...). Solution: make this country slightly less "dog eat dog" and you'll solve a LOT of social issues almost overnight.

Is there evidence for this? An alternative explanation is that black and Hispanic people are more likely to be religious, and religious people have lower suicide rates in the United States. They are also more likely to have kids, which also is associated with lower suicide rates.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#207

Post by coldtea »

dmwallin wrote: post #189
14 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really hope we do not get a UBI in any current forms. I know the second the stores realize that every person now has 'x' amount of dollars to spend, they will raise the prices to match the most they can extract. What I wish Canada would do instead is establish some sort of Universal Basic Rights like every man woman and child is entitled to 5lbs of potatoes a week, 1 gallon of milk, 1 pound of carrots, ect. I as a…

> I know the second the stores realize that every person now has 'x' amount of dollars to spend, they will raise the prices to match the most they can extract. That's not how economics works. The prices most stores charge is limited by competition. The only areas you might see an effect are in ones where supply is highly, and likely artificially, constrained.

>That's not how economics works. The prices most stores charge is limited by competition.

There would be no much change in competition, as everybody that sells anything of low-medium value will benefit from the increased spending capacity UBI receivers. The increased demand across all competitors will raise prices.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#208

Post by microcolonel »

godelski wrote: post #61
emptybits wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re/ medicare for all ... Canada has universal health care yet a very similar suicide rate to the USA.[1] Canada doesn't have a livable minimum wage either. Each province sets its own. There is talk of UBI experiments. [1] https://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2011/02/us-vs-can...

But there's other factors there. Do we know if there was a change after Canada switched to universal health care?

I think it would be hard to compare the two times. Canada is unrecognizable in so many ways when compared with Canada before that point in time. We got a constitution, no-fault divorce, and a whole lot of other major changes in the course of about ten years, the same ten years the provincial health insurance was introduced AFAIK.

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#209

Post by ceejayoz »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #194
ceejayoz wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ready availability of competing labor. Minimum wage jobs are frequently difficult and labor-intensive, but the individual workers are replaceable. The idea that pay rate and effort required are perfectly linked is what I'm contesting.

You are right. I was wrong to link "hard work" and "pay". I should have linked "skilled work" and "pay". Don't people work hard to become more skilled though?

That takes another scarce resource, time.

(And frequently money.)

Re: For suicide prevention, try raising the minimum wage, research suggests

#210

Post by codegrappler »

amelius wrote: post #110
gremlinsinc wrote: post #2

I wonder what would happen to the suicide rate with medicare for all, and creating a max-wage that is (avg of contractors + employees * 150), or something similar, w/ additional 'bonus' multipliers for increasing # of U.S. hired. UBI would also probably help. As a freelancer I've had some really slim months and depression hits hard when money is tight. There's a very direct correlation between income security, insecu…

I think a max wage totally makes sense, because nobody is more than a modest constant times more productive than anyone else, and anything created by a person is always built on existing knowledge and constructs created by society. Also, risk does not really exist anymore these days (with minimum wages, financial constructs around bankruptcy, etc.)

High risk jobs need to be compensated accordingly as well. Artificially capping wages will dissuade people from entering those fields.
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