Index of well-being hits a 20-year low

NEW YORK - Increases in child abuse and child poverty have driven the nation's social well-being to its lowest point in two decades, according to a study released Monday by social scientists at Fordham University.

The scientists also evaluated Americans' confidence in their quality of life, and they said it was strikingly low. The seventh annual report, "The Index of Social Health," tries to monitor the well-being of American society by examining statistics from reports by the Census Bureau on 16 major social problems, including teenage suicide, unemployment, drug abuse, the high-school dropout rate and the lack of affordable housing.

Aided by a computer model, the researchers use the statistics from the 16 categories to reach a single figure between 0 to 100, which they call the index of social health.

The first year for which the scientists measured social health, 1970, had an index of 75, which the researchers said was above average. But in 1991, the most recent year for which complete data was available, the index was 36, down from 42 in 1990 and less than half the highest index rating of 79 in 1972.

The 1991 figure is "awful," said Marc L. Miringoff, the author of the study and the director of the Fordham University Institute for Innovation in Social Policy in Tarrytown, New York.

"These results reveal as much about what is happening to us as the economic indicators that we watch closely every day," he said.

Two major reasons for the drop, Mr. Miringoff said, are that child abuse reached its worst recorded level and that the number of children living in poverty reached its worst level since 1983.

Also eroding society's health was a decline in average weekly earn­ings, he said. "The decline in the economy has much to do with the de­cline in our social health," Mr. Miringoff said.

A new feature of the report, the Index of Social Confidence, polled 1,200 Americans to show how they evaluate national performance in ar­eas that shape the quality of life: education, health care, safety, occupa­tion and living standard.

The result was a confidence index of 34, which Mr. Miringoff called disturbingly low. He said the respondents to the survey saw serious problems in the nation's social well-being and were pessimistic about the future.

International Herald Tribune

Текст 9 russia scans the stars, and the future is mostly bad

Astrology Booms in Russia

MOSCOW- In Russia, astrologers do not sugarcoat the news.

"Today is a largely dangerous day," one recent, typical horoscope warned from the pages of the newspaper Kommersant.

"You may end up broke," one warning goes. "This day is entirely unsuitable for undertakings of any sort."

The next day may not be any better: "Fraud, cheating and crooked deals are only a small fraction of the troubles that threaten to disrupt all your plans today," another Kommersant chart began.

Banned in Soviet days as beneath the dignity of scientific Marxism, astrology has caught on in a big way in the new Russia. Russians may hear their future on the radio, see it on television, call for a personalised account by telephone or read it in almost any newspaper or magazine.

Even in the official government newspaper Rossiskie Vesti, there is a horoscope devoted entirely to health: "Your health reserves are low," it warned one day. "You may have problems with your spine," it added. Or, "It would be best to refrain from sexual relations. Diseases beginning today may last a long time."

Even when the signs are auspicious, Russian astrologers can find a downside.

"A growing energy field during this week will be a stimulus for ac­tion," the astrologer of Moskovsky Komsomolets predicted recently. "But if you don't surrender to its influence, the result may be a serious dis­ease or nervous breakdown."

It is no secret, of course, that Americans love happy endings - to the point of childishness, many Russians say - while Russians enjoy wallowing in the trough of despondency. No one curls up with a bowl of popcorn and "The Brothers Karamazov" to cheer up.

Neither is there any question that many Russians' lives are exceed­ingly troubled.

If you fight for the communal toilet every morning, get splattered by street slush every day and scrimp on sugar for your tea each evening, you may justifiably feel sceptical of a rosy horoscope.

But the difference in astrological approach raises questions: Are the planets really so different over the Western Hemisphere? Are American astrologers lying to spare their readers pain? Or could it be that Russians are unhappy, at least in part, because they read their horoscopes too faithfully?

"It can be pretty pessimistic," acknowledged Yelena Myasnikova, chief editor of the Russian edition of Cosmopolitan.

In the current issue of that magazine, for example, Tamara Globa listed the "fortunate" days in November and December, a total of 12, and the "negative" days, 28 in all. "We're not very happy about that, because we want Cosmopolitan to be a very optimistic magazine," Ms. Myasnik­ova said. "But when you're dealing with a famous person, a real authority in the field, of course it's very difficult to say: 'Don't write what you really think. Write that everything will turn out O.K.'"

Ms. Globa appears to be in no danger of that. "November is the hardest month," she warned Aquarians. "It will bring the loss of friends and protectors, hostility and deceit, and problems with your parents. Be careful about your health."

Valery Ledovskikh, the pen name of the astrologer who writes weekly in Kommersant, Russia's leading business newspaper, would have his readers simply wait for another day.

"All attempts to interfere with the natural course of events and to change it for the better will lead to no good results," he wrote on one re­cent gloomy day.

"The only thing you can do," he added, "is tighten up security on your delivery trucks."

International Herald Tribune