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In this episode we cover a very serious topic based on a New York Times article published in March 2020. The article is reporting research done by economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton. Their research that, within the past few years, "deaths of despair" have been sky rocketing for white non-college educated Americans of all ages. This is the topic of our podcast. We start with some levity regarding how great the Korean restaurant we had just had dinner at was (Korean BBQ and Sushi in Nolensville). We talked about how Asian's in general and the Japanese in particular are healthier and have longer avg life expectancy than Americans and Europeans, and it isnt because of healthy living, based on my experience living in Japan. Japanese drink and smoke more than Americans's on avg, and deal with long commute times and other internal stresses that should contribute to illnesses and reduced life expectancy. But Japanese have the highest life expectancy of any nation and our conclusion its a large part to their diet being so healthy. We discuss the findings from the study reported in the article that report that white adults without a college degree are reporting relatively rapid negative changes in things such as self reported happiness, marriage, church attendance, self reported neck back or joint pain, and drinking, vs similar cohorts with college degrees where such trends are fairly stable over time. Quote from this segment: "Often blue collar workers are under tremendous economic stress and "see no way out of the cage". Jimmy talks about his brother who drank himself to death. We both agree that having a college degree is not a magic potion, it doesn't suddenly make everything better, but on average what it means to have gotten a college degree vs not and what that says about socioeconomic conditions is more about what is causing the divergence. The answer is not to "just try harder". Many blue collar families are already doing everything they can and there is no way "trying harder" will help them. We talk about American healthcare and how the US is the only developed country in the world people go bankrupt due to health care costs. We talk about the stigma of "socialized medicine". Jimmy says how the cost of his wife's insulin for her Type 1 diabetes amounts to almost the same amount as their monthly mortgage. WE discuss the topic of benchmarking and how, although this is a common practice for companies to compare their performance on a number of measurements vs. other like companies in their field, benchmarking is not widely embraced by Americans. We talk about how the USA has the highest percentage of our population incarcerated of any other developed country, and how this ends up costing us twice: once by the added burden of paying for the incarceration, and secondly how the incarcerated are no longer able to be productive members of our society and contribute to our society and economy at large. QUOTE: "so many Americans are focused on fear." Finally we end on a light note extolling the virtues of kombucha and sushi.