Global wealth distribution; American abortion trends; Sexual violence data

American wealth inequality, 2010 data

In addition to wealth inequality in America. There are other forms of wealth inequality. Nature writes: 

Researchers have argued that wealthy nations rely on a large net appropriation of labor and resources from the rest of the world through unequal exchange in international trade and global commodity chains. Here we assess this empirically by measuring flows of embodied labor in the world economy from 1995–2021, accounting for skill levels, sectors and wages. We find that, in 2021, the economies of the global North net-appropriated 826 billion hours of embodied labor from the global South, across all skill levels and sectors. The wage value of this net-appropriated labor was equivalent to €16.9 trillion in Northern prices, accounting for skill level. This appropriation roughly doubles the labor that is available for Northern consumption but drains the South of productive capacity that could be used instead for local human needs and development. Unequal exchange is understood to be driven in part by systematic wage inequalities. We find Southern wages are 87–95% lower than Northern wages for work of equal skill. While Southern workers contribute 90% of the labor that powers the world economy, they receive only 21% of global income.

In this study, we use the EEMRIO model EXIOBASE to track flows of embodied labor between North and South, for the first time accounting directly for sectors, wages and skill levels (as defined by the International Labor Organization, ILO, described in Methods). This enables us to define the scale of labor appropriation through unequal exchange in terms of physical labor time, while also representing it in terms of wage value, in a manner that accounts for the skill level composition of labor embodied in North–South trade. Our category for the global North approximates the IMF list of ‘advanced economies’, with the South comprising all emerging and developing economies (see Methods). All monetary units are in constant 2005 Euros, corrected for inflation, represented in market exchange rates (MER), which is appropriate for international comparisons of income purchasing power in the global economy (see Methods).

We arrive at several major conclusions. (1) We find that the labor of production in the world economy, across all skill levels and all sectors, is overwhelmingly performed in the global South (on average 90–91%), but the yields of production are disproportionately captured in the global North. (2) The North net-appropriated 826 billion hours of embodied labor from the global South in 2021 (in other words, net of trade). This net appropriation occurs across all skill categories and sectors, including a large net appropriation of high-skilled labor. (3) The wage value of net-appropriated labor was €16.9 trillion in 2021, represented in Northern wages, accounting for skill level. In wage-value terms, the drain of labor from the South has more than doubled since 1995. 4) North–South wage gaps have increased dramatically over the period, across all skill categories and sectors, despite a small improvement in the South’s relative position. Southern wages are 87–95% lower than Northern wages for work of equal skill as of 2021, and 83–98% lower for work of equal skill within the same sector. (5) Workers’ share of GDP has generally declined over the period, by 1.3 percentage points in the global North and 1.6 percentage points in the global South.

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The Australian and New Zealand science source Scimex reports:

More US women are attempting abortions without 

medical assistance since the laws changed

The proportion of women in the US who have attempted an abortion without medical assistance has increased since the country's Supreme Court overruled federal abortion protections, according to an international study. The researchers conducted a series of online surveys in late 2021-early 2022 and then again in mid 2023, asking women whether they had "ever taken or done something on their own, without medical assistance, to try to end a pregnancy". With just over 7,000 respondents each for the earlier and later surveys, the researchers say 2.4% of women in the earlier survey reported having self-managed an abortion, which rose to 3.3% in the later survey. The researchers say many who shared their stories were from marginalized groups and often used ineffective methods.

It is a small increase, but an increase was reasonably predictable. The research paper comments:

To our knowledge, this study represents the first population-based estimate of changes in attempts to self-manage abortion before and after the Dobbs decision. We observed an increase in the proportion of the US female population of reproductive age that reported experience with SMA [self-managed abortion] from 2.4% in 2021 to 3.4% in 2023, suggesting people are increasingly relying on self-sourced methods to end a pregnancy. This is likely a conservative estimate, given underreporting of abortion in self-administered surveys. Assuming people underreport SMA to the same degree they do past-year, facility-based abortion, the proportion with SMA experience increased from approximately 5% before Dobbs to 7% after Dobbs.

We all know where this is going.

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A Lancet research paper reports:

Intimate partner violence against adolescent girls: regional and national prevalence estimates and associated country-level factors

Intimate partner violence is a serious public health problem and negatively affects short-term and long-term health, development, and wellbeing of adolescent girls. Global estimates from WHO have shown that adolescent girls aged 15–19 years experience high rates of intimate partner violence. We aimed to estimate the lifetime and past-year prevalence and patterns of physical or sexual intimate partner violence against adolescent girls by male partners across 161 countries and areas, and to examine the country-level factors, including the prevalence of child marriage, associated with the lifetime and past-year prevalence of intimate partner violence in this age group.

Overall, the prevalence of both lifetime (154 countries) and past-year (157 countries) intimate partner violence against adolescent girls was higher in low-income and lower-middle-income countries and regions than in high-income countries and regions. Countries with higher rates of female secondary school enrolment and those with inheritance laws that are more gender-equal had lower prevalence of intimate partner violence against adolescent girls. Lower-income countries and societies with a high prevalence of child marriage had higher prevalence of physical or sexual intimate partner violence against adolescent girls.

Past-year physical or sexual (or both) intimate partner violence

Hey! Canada and Mexico are better than America -- not MAGA!