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Higher median income places tend to have a fewer percentage of poor people. Probably some people assume poverty correlates to suicide rate. The authors did the best they could at making sense of the data they had.

Here’s a map of suicide rate in Italy. Note the north has higher rate of suicide than the south. The north of Italy is much richer than the south.

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As someone else said, it's the inequality that matters. People don't die by suicide from being poor, they do it because of the low self-esteem poverty causes when you're around many people doing better than you. Many very poor countries have suicide rates much lower than the US.

Mountain towns have about the biggest class dichotomy that I've seen anywhere between the wealthy and the "help." Unlike many other places, they're all in close proximity.

I assume that mainly comes down to attractions like ski resorts (an activity that thrives on altitude and money) pulling in rich tourists and, more recently than this study, remote employees. Curious to hear other contributing factors for mountain town issues. And on the flip side: what types of locations tend to have the most socioeconomic equality?

That is certainly plausible and worth looking into.

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