Economist traces height trends (via Economist's View):
When John Komlos wants to take the measure of a nation's economic well-being, he doesn't check its gross domestic product or consumer price index. He ignores its average household income and unemployment figures.
Instead, Komlos takes a look at how tall its people have grown.
"Height is a very good overall indicator of how well the human organism thrives in its socioeconomic environment," he explained.
(...)
What Komlos has learned is that Americans, despite their nation's prosperity, abundance of food and cutting-edge medical technology, stopped getting taller in the 1950s and have now been passed by their European cousins.
"Americans were head and shoulders above Europeans in the 18th Century, and it stayed that way for two centuries," he said. "Now it's the other way around."
This, according to Komlos, suggests that Europeans eat better, have better access to health care and enjoy a more equitable distribution of national wealth. They will almost certainly live longer than their American counterparts.
3 comments:
a ideia é original, mas pouco viavel.
é verdade que a alimentaçao e o estilo de vida influenciam a altura dos individuos. no entanto, a genetica tem um peso igualmente grande, entao se extrapolarmos isto para por exemplo; japoneses em comparaçao com individuos da europa de leste...
"a genetica tem um peso igualmente grande"
Se estivermos a falar da altura num dado momento, sim.
Se estivermos a falar da variação da altura ao longo do tempo, de geração para geração, não
sim, entao teriamos de fazer um quoficiente de correçao; 1 cm num japones tem o mesmo peso que um centimetro num individuo da europa de leste?
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