This is really a terrible article; the worst kind of anec-data.
e.g. Yes, the U.S. does spend a large GDP share on health care; and you can make legitimately make the argument that it gets poor value. However, the single comparandum relied on is overall life expectancy.
Union membership dropped from over 30% in the early 1950s to about 12% by 2000, during which time the U.S. labor share was pretty much range-bound - but the article ignores that and simply asserts that the change in union membership is the cause.
That chart on "hours worked per year" is based on OECD data published with the following health warning: "the data are intended for comparisons of trends over time; they are unsuitable for comparisons of the level of average annual hours of work for a given year, because of differences in their sources and method of calculation" ... emphasis is mine.
e.g. Yes, the U.S. does spend a large GDP share on health care; and you can make legitimately make the argument that it gets poor value. However, the single comparandum relied on is overall life expectancy.
Union membership dropped from over 30% in the early 1950s to about 12% by 2000, during which time the U.S. labor share was pretty much range-bound - but the article ignores that and simply asserts that the change in union membership is the cause.
That chart on "hours worked per year" is based on OECD data published with the following health warning: "the data are intended for comparisons of trends over time; they are unsuitable for comparisons of the level of average annual hours of work for a given year, because of differences in their sources and method of calculation" ... emphasis is mine.
Original source here: https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm