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Slide Guitar's avatar

I understand what Beckley is saying, but where would you rather be poor: Japan or Mississippi?

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Ann P's avatar

I donтАЩt know what life is like in Japan, so I canтАЩt answer that question. I did watch the tv show тАЬSunnyтАЭ, so based on that I vote for Mississippi. I hear they have a very high suicide rate in Japan. In fact, according to the NIH, suicide rates in Japan compared to the US are 2 times higher for men, and 3 times higher for women, and all of it based on тАЬoverworkтАЭ.

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Jason S.'s avatar

I lived and worked in Japan for 8 years and can attest to the fact that suicide and overwork are, sadly, widespread problems there. However, I don't think overwork is prevalent in all sectors, nor are the higher suicide rates entirely to blame on overwork.

And even given these issues, the question of which place you'd rather live in is still highly objective and complex.

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Clay Banes's avatar

The numbers sound strange. It reminds me of that Disraeli quote about three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. Germany behind Alabama and Mississippi?

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Aoife Hendriks's avatar

Really strange. Average debt to GDP is 270%??? Where is he pulling these numbers from? Greece is the worst in the EU at 158%. I'm just going to list the countries I've lived in recently: The Netherlands 43.2%, Ireland 42.2%, Germany 64%. The USA? 124%.

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HJ Boer's avatar

Came here to make the same comment, thank you! A lot of what he was saying makes sense but he sounds very sure about the future of China and Europe without considering plausible scenarios. It does not help that he gets such basic facts wrong.

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Aoife Hendriks's avatar

Plus we all remember WW2 (at least at my age in my 40s) which is why Elons nazi salute was reported as such all over Europe and wasn't called "a Roman salute "

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