Choking deaths on food in the US

Between 2005 and 2021, as the United States steadily reduced its librarian workforce, Americans choked on food at a correlated rate — a negative r of -0.97 that implies librarians were somehow keeping the national swallowing reflex in order. The mechanism is not immediately obvious but could involve the calming effect of enforced silence, or the possibility that library patrons are forbidden from eating. As libraries shed staff, America apparently forgot how to eat carefully. The Dewey Decimal System, it turns out, contained a chapter on chewing.

US librarian employment declined from approximately 158,000 in 2005 to under 120,000 by 2021, driven by municipal budget constraints, digital resource migration, and reduced foot traffic as online information access expanded. Food choking deaths increased over the same period, primarily due to population aging — adults over 65 account for the majority of such fatalities, and their share of the US population grew substantially from 2005 to 2021. Both trends have nothing to do with each other and everything to do with demographics: one reflects an institution losing funding in the digital age, the other reflects an aging population encountering biological hazards.

The cruelest correlations are the ones that make a declining profession look like a public health intervention. Librarians are doing important work; fighting choking is simply not among their documented services.