Why Americans have the shortest life-expectancy of any industrialized country

18 January 2026, by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)

Ever since 1986, when Austria had an even lower life-expectancy than the U.S. did, there has been NO EU or other U.S.-allied country that has had as low a life-expectancy as the U.S. had, and the size of this difference has been steadily increasing year-after-year, so that what had been a small difference between the U.S. and its peers in 1982 (just six tenths of a year) is now, as-of the latest year, 2023, 4.1 years. All of that information can be seen in an interactive graph, “Life expectancy in the U.S. remains far below peer countries”, which starts in 1980, and ends in 2023.

The difference between the U.S. and its peers is that the U.S. Government is by far the most corrupt — controlled ONLY by its billionaires, who have a collective stranglehold over the Government, by means of their buying not only ‘news’-media and the universities and think tanks, but buying the political candidates that those billionaires and their agents in the media and in academia then pump, so that ONLY a candidate who is backed by at least one billionaire-backer has any realistic chance of winning a seat in Congress or as a state Governor, much less America’s Presidency — which is drawn from that group and who are funded in each of the two Parties mainly by that Party’s megadonors. All of this information can be seen documented HERE.

A good indication of the difference in the extent of the corruptness of America’s Government versus those in its colonies (America’s ‘allies’) is the extent to which America versus the EU allow poisons into their food. A Google search for the string

eu versus u.s. pesticide regulations crops

produces:

AI Overview

The EU and US have fundamentally different pesticide approaches: the EU uses a precautionary principle, banning substances if potential harm (like carcinogenicity) is credible, even with low exposure, putting the burden on industry to prove safety; the US uses a risk-benefit system, allowing use if benefits outweigh risks, leading to many pesticides banned in the EU remaining in US use, causing uncertainty for exporters and ongoing debate over health/environmental impacts.

European Union (EU) Regulations

• Precautionary Principle: Proactive banning of substances with properties like carcinogens, mutagens, or endocrine disruptors, regardless of exposure levels.

• Burden of Proof: On the pesticide manufacturer to prove safety.

• Focus: Protecting human and environmental health, promoting sustainable farming (CAP).

• Impact: Stricter bans, creating challenges for US exporters due to lower Maximum Residue Levels (MRLs).

United States (US) Regulations

• Risk-Based Approach: Allows use if the benefit (crop protection, yield) outweighs the risk, requiring significant harm evidence for action.

• Regulatory Body: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

• Focus: Risk-benefit analysis, with approvals often lasting longer than in the EU.

• Impact: Continues to permit many pesticides banned in the EU, leading to significant differences in available crop protection products.

Key Differences in Practice

• Banned Pesticides: The US allows many pesticides (e.g., chlorpyrifos, paraquat, neonicotinoids) that are banned or phased out in the EU.

• Proactive vs. Reactive: EU bans more readily; US waits for definitive proof of harm.

• Economic Factors: US voluntary phase-outs often driven by economics rather than just risk, creating bias towards continued use.

• Trade Implications: EU restrictions create technical barriers for US farmers exporting crops.

Whereas America’s Founders, long before this became an extremely corrupt country, established the criminal laws that apply to criminal defendants, on the basis that a defendant is innocent unless proven guilty — in order to protect the public against any tyrannous government — today’s American Government applies that principle in the billionaires’ (who now control the Government) distorted form, regarding the products and services that the billionaires’ corporations produce and market, which is that a product or service is safe unless a high enough percentage of the population are dying from it, in which cases a product or service itself is legally being held to be innocent unless proven guilty. (In a democracy, a product or service is NOT a citizen and therefore is NOT represented in the Government.) Actual human life just isn’t so important in a Government that has degenerated from being at least somewhat one-person-one-vote, to being now effectively one-dollar-one-vote, just like a corporation is run: one-share-one-vote. Property controls; the aristocracy control; the mere persons (citizens) don’t. So, this is what Mussolini praised as his system of Government and called alternatively “fascism” and “corporationism.” It’s the dictatorial form of capitalism, and it is what any electoral democracy tends to degenerate into. America’s already did. The EU’s are only degenerating into it.

If the billionaires’ agents, such as Transparency International and the media and universities haven’t told you about this, that’s just natural. America is an extremely corrupt country, and it is the imperial power in the largest empire in all of human history.

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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.