Health Equity Related News 

Why America is losing the health race
june 2014-the new yorker

Self-interest may be a natural human trait, but when it comes to public health other countries are showing the U.S. that what appears at first to be an altruistic concern for the health and care of the most vulnerable—especially children—may well result in improved health for all members of a society, including the affluent. Until Americans find their way to understanding this dynamic, and figure out how to mobilize public opinion in its favor, they will all continue to lose out on better health and longer lives. Read more

Minnesota department of health releases health equity report to legislature
february 2014

Read here

Who belongs to the lower middle class and why does it matter?
december 2013-The new yorker 

In recent years, the cultural conversation about inequality has focussed on the rich and poor themselves...but the problem is structural. Over time, we have set up an economic system that breeds inequality. The good news is that the U.S. and many other countries also employ a system, called democracy, in which everyone—the ninety-nine per cent and the one per cent together—can demand that the government work to fix the problem. Read more

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The social science behind obama's economic mobility speech
december 2013-the atlantic

In a speech Wednesday, President Obama sought to move past the old race-based discourse on poverty to an understanding of class stasis as a problem that transcends race. Though he's winning praise for strategic smarts, it's not just a political move: The underlying reality of American life really has changed, and certain socioeconomic experiences now transcend race, according to research from the Saguaro Seminar at Harvard's Kennedy School. Read more

The Lasting Impacts of Poverty on the brain
October 2013-The atlantic

That finding offered a glimpse of what poverty does to a person during a moment in time. Picture a mother trying to accomplish a single task (making dinner) while preoccupied with another (paying the rent on time). But scientists also suspect that poverty's disadvantages – and these moments – accumulate across time. Live in poverty for years, or even generations, and its effects grow more insidious. Live in poverty as a child, and it affects you as an adult, too. Read more

How poverty taxes the brain
august 2013-the atlantic

Researchers publishing some groundbreaking findings today in the journalScience have concluded that poverty imposes such a massive cognitive load on the poor that they have little bandwidth left over to do many of the things that might lift them out of poverty – like go to night school, or search for a new job, or even remember to pay bills on time. Read more.

Stress and Status
July 2013-New York Times

That sense of control tends to decline as one descends the socioeconomic ladder, with potentially grave consequences. Those on the bottom are more than three times as likely to die prematurely as those at the top. They’re also more likely to suffer from depression, heart disease and diabetes. Perhaps most devastating, the stress of poverty early in life can have consequences that last into adulthood. Read more.

In climbing income ladder, location matters
july 2013-new york times

A study finds the odds of rising to another income level are notably low in certain cities, like Atlanta and Charlotte, and much higher in New York and Boston. Read more

Milwaukee poverty rates revealed.
June 2013-Milwaukee journal sentinel

About 35% of the workforce in the city of Milwaukee earn "poverty level wages," according to a report released June 2013 by the Center on Wisconsin Strategy. Read more

Unemployment is killing America's economically vulnerable women early.
May 2013-the guardian

Americans are living longer than ever but average lifespan of white, female high school drop-outs has plunged dramatically. Read more

Who lives longest?
march 2013-New york times

Researchers note: “Look at the countries with the highest average life expectancy...nations that distribute their health resources more evenly." Read more