
They are also so high because of our poor FDA food standards and the stressful, unhealthy lifestyles society in the US promotes compared to other fully developed countries. When you have private healthcare, there is no incentive for making the population healthier because profits will go down.
Also, our infrastructure is NOTORIOUSLY shitty for pedestrians. We desperately need vast implementation of public transit instead of trying to double down on overly car-centric infrastructure that is proving to solve no problems anyway. “Why don’t you walk more?” – Walk where??? We need a vastly higher variety of safe, dedicated spaces for walking/biking.
I live in Philly and we have the literal WORST protected bike lanes. They put them next to the sidewalk, but they didn’t put up a curb to separate them from the street. Instead, they put those shitty PVC Deliniators and expect cars that are street parking to act as the barrier. It’s great until you see some jerkoff using the bike lanes as his personal parking lane or until cars have to move once the 2 hour limit is up.
A lot of the bike lanes are fairly new tbh, but quality of life would be so much better if they just made the lanes separated from the road by a curb. 76 is literal fucking hell on earth for both motorists and pedestrians. The only decent thing is the pedestrian bridge between manayunk and bala cynwyd, it’s like a piece of heaven in the deepest pits of despair 😭