Conservative Policies Linked to Higher Death Rates for Americans, Study Finds
November’s midterms will serve as a political referendum on a number of issues, from gas prices to gun safety legislation and more. “At the end of the day, it’s just politics,” you might think. But according to new research, social and economic policies are life-or-death matters for working-age Americans. Changing state policies to become more liberal will save hundreds of thousands of lives while shifting to conservative policies will cost them, a study published Wednesday in PLoS ONE finds.
The new study is one of a recent spate to look at the link between policy and an unexpected increase in deaths among working-age Americans. Compared to European countries and other Western peers, the rise in deaths among this population in the U.S. has been “alarming,” Jennifer Karas Montez, a sociology researcher at Syracuse University and the first author of the new research, told The Daily Beast. She and her co-authors looked at mortality rates for the leading causes of death over a period of 20 years, at a time when “dramatic changes in state policies” were occuring.
The link between more conservative or liberal state policies and events like cardiovascular deaths or suicides are clearer for some policies, like regulations around tobacco. More liberal environmental policies are linked to lower levels of air pollution and decreased rates of asthma and other respiratory problems that can increase one’s chances of dying, Montez said. Liberal labor policies, like an increased minimum wage, may put more money in workers’ pockets that they can spend on healthier food or medical care.