This is going to be a short diary, but I wanted to piggyback on Joan McCarter's diary Killing the zombie lie that 'we're all living longer' because something that should be noted and never far from any progressive's rhetorical toolbox is one simple and compelling fact: the more wealth you have, the more life you get; the less wealth you have, the less life you get.
It's a cliché, I know, and God help me I can feel the eyes of Jim, my Creative Writing instructor from college, boring holes in my forehead as I write this, but it's a sad fact of life that money can't buy you love. It can, it turns out, buy you life.
Joan McCarter's diary is a strong denunciation of a zombie lie that's risen over and over again. I've heard the admonition that Social Security must be reformed because we're all living decades longer out of the mouth of no less a liberal icon than Toby Ziegler, Josiah Bartlett's prickly Director of Communications, and advocate for all things liberal and good*.
But we're not living decades longer, and we're not "all" living longer at all. Some of us are living roughly exactly as long as did our great-great grandparents, and some of us are getting the better half of a decade more life than did their parents. Can you guess the number one indicator of who lives longer and who doesn't? If you can't, you should probably relinquish your License to Kossack and scat, kitty cat.
The number one predictor of life expectancy has been so for thousands of years. Yeah, of course it's wealth. The wealthy are living longer. The poor aren't. That's the story. That's all the punchline you need. I made a chart.
Source
So, we're all created equal kids, and Jeebus loves us all the same. But rich people are more equal than poor people, and God only answers prayers if you ante up first. And they all lived happily ever after...well, some of them did, anyways.
*Yeah, I'm a West Wing fan, are you kidding? I became a writer for the Federal government explicitly and unambiguously because I want to work in a White House speechwriting shop, I shit you not.