Adolescent Mortality Rates & Minority Contracting

00:03: After decades of steady decline, adolescent mortality rates are now increasing.

00:09: What accounts for the troubling trend?

00:11: I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley.

00:15: It's June 3rd, and this is a Saturday edition of Morning Wire.

00:23: With the Supreme Court poised to hand down a ruling on affirmative action,

00:27: questions loom about the future of race-based government contracts.

00:31: What is minority contracting?

00:33: And how could a ruling on college admissions affect the U.S. economy down the line?

00:38: And San Francisco's mayor has a new plan to cut homelessness in half, but it won't come cheap.

00:43: What is the new plan and how much will it cost taxpayers?

00:47: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

00:55: According to a new report after years of decline, the mortality rate among American children

01:00: is now rising at rates not seen in a half century.

01:04: The news comes as depression rates among the general population has also risen to an all-time high.

01:10: Here with more on the concerning trend and what's behind it is daily wire senior editor,

01:14: Cabot Phillips.

01:16: So Cabot, not the kind of story we like to report, what do we know?

01:19: Yeah, it's not good news.

01:21: So for the last 50 years with advancements in medical field and improvements in car safety,

01:25: mortality rates among young Americans plummeted, falling 65% from 1970 to 2018.

01:31: But in recent years, that trend has reversed.

01:34: According to a recent report from the Journal of the American Medical Association, from 2019

01:38: to 2021, the death rate for American children and adolescents climbed to 20% marking the steepest increase on record.

01:45: We're still waiting on the final federal data from 2022, but unfortunately, all indications

01:49: point to another similar increase. So it's not getting any better.

01:53: So the big question, what's behind the spike in deaths?

01:57: Four main causes of death are having an outsized impact on the trend. Drug overdoses, homicides,

02:02: auto accidents, and suicide are all on the rise. When it comes to drugs, fentanyl has

02:07: fueled a major spike nationwide for all ages when it comes to overdoses. Last year, fentanyl

02:11: was the leading cause of death among Americans 18 to 45. And young people are unfortunately

02:17: no exception. From 2010 to 2020, fatal overdoses among American adolescents doubled and then

02:22: rose another 20% in 2021 alone. While rates of drug use among young people actually are not

02:28: on the rise, deadly overdoses are, in large part because of the prevalence of fentanyl.

02:33: Similarly, the homicide rate among adolescents has also spiked, rising 30% from 2019 to 2020,

02:39: and continuing up ever since. And if you look at the numbers, there's a clear demographic breakdown

02:44: between those two types of death. White adolescents accounted for about 60% of drug overdose deaths

02:49: over the last three years, while black adolescents accounted for nearly two-thirds of homicide deaths.

02:55: Now, what about car accidents and suicide? I think that's what most people think of when they

02:58: think about adolescent deaths. Well, auto deaths among adolescents also rose 23% from 2019 to 2021,

03:06: and there are a few theories on the cause there. Distracted driving, especially with cell phones,

03:10: has been on the rise and during COVID, there were also fewer cars on the road leaving many people

03:15: to drive more recklessly. With regard to suicide rates went up 18 percent over that same time frame

03:20: with younger boys seeing the highest spike. Last week we discussed some really disturbing

03:25: data about the effects of social media on kids. What does the data look like right now for depression

03:30: and kids and teens? Yeah, more bad news on that front. According to a new Gallup report, the number

03:34: of Americans who say they've been diagnosed with depression at some point has risen to 29 percent,

03:39: while 17% say they're currently being treated for depression.

03:43: Not only is that the highest mark on record,

03:45: but it's almost 10 points higher than what we saw as recently as 2015.

03:49: The rates are highest among women with 36% saying they've been diagnosed.

03:52: That's almost twice as high as the number we see for men,

03:55: which is around 20% though, that figure has also doubled among men since 2017.

04:00: And looking at the generational data,

04:01: Americans under 29 are most likely to report current depression.

04:05: They're at around 25%.

04:07: So some stunning and concerning figures for sure. So what's behind the rise on that front?

04:12: Well, COVID lockdowns appear to have played a significant role when it comes to mental health.

04:16: There's millions of Americans who are isolated from their communities and loved ones. Depression

04:20: rates had been rising slowly before 2019, but really spiked in 2020 and continued to go up throughout

04:26: the next two years. But what's really concerning is that in 2022, the rates continue to go up even

04:31: as lockdowns came to an end. Implying the effects of that isolation are longer lasting than we'd we'd hope for.

04:37: Like we reported last week, experts say social media is also playing a key role, especially among younger Americans.

04:42: There's overwhelming evidence that shows a direct correlation between screen time, social media use, and depression rates.

04:49: There's also a slew of data showing that depression rates among adolescents in broken homes

04:53: are far higher than their counterparts, which is especially concerning when you consider

04:56: the rapid decrease in two parent homes.

04:59: Now, it is worth noting, there are skeptics who say that overall depression rates are

05:03: potentially exaggerated. In their view, medical professionals diagnose anyone going through

05:07: a rough patch or feeling down as being clinically depressed. And in their view, many people

05:11: might mistakenly think they have a mental illness, which could skew the data. But regardless,

05:16: a concerning trend that only seems to be getting worse.

05:18: Absolutely. Cabot, thanks for reporting. Anytime.

05:27: Any day now, the Supreme Court has expected to hand down a ruling on affirmative action.

05:32: ruling will have far reaching implications for colleges and may pretend broader changes in the workplace in the future.

05:39: Yet, there is another kind of affirmative action that gets less attention, but could be of even greater significance.

05:45: Here to discuss is the Director of Research at the Manhattan Institute, Judge Glock.

05:49: Judge, thanks for coming on.

05:51: Thanks so much for having me back.

05:52: Now, you recently wrote a piece for City Journal called Welcome to the World of Minority Contracting.

05:59: What is minority contracting?

06:00: Basically, it's a government policy and this happens at all levels of government federal,

06:05: state and local to favor minority owned businesses when awarding contracts.

06:10: That means, say, if a city wants to issue a road paving contract, they allow minority

06:15: businesses to charge higher prices, their competitors, and still get the contract.

06:20: Sometimes, governments have certain types of contracts, have to go to minorities and no white owned companies can compete.

06:27: government can just give contracts out without any competition at all as long as that company

06:32: is owned by a minority. Now, how common is this? It's very common at this point. In fact,

06:38: it would be really hard to kind of overstate how big these programs are. It's really

06:43: big part of what government America does today, award contracts, everything from building

06:47: new aircraft carrier to buy a cow-eat software. Many politicians have set really high goals

06:53: for awarding a percentage of these contracts to minorities. So President Biden said he wanted

06:59: 15% of all federal contracts to go to minorities. Uh, state and city of New York said he want 30%

07:04: of all contracts to go to minority owned businesses. So we're talking at least tens of billions of

07:09: dollars a year for these race-based contracts. Well, aside from the ethical questions,

07:14: do these type of quotas have a cost for taxpayers? Yes, there's lots of different ways to measure

07:20: these costs. As I said, sometimes they just allow minority businesses to charge a higher rate than

07:25: their competitors. And you can see that in the cost to taxpayers. But one way to look at this is to

07:30: look at what happened in California when they had a vote in the 1990s that banned racial preferences.

07:36: The focus then, as always, was with colleges and jobs and so forth. But the vote also affected

07:41: these contracting programs. And one economist who studied what happened found that the highways,

07:47: for instance, the fund by the state were much cheaper after these racial preferences were

07:51: ended, about 6% cheaper because they didn't have to meet all these minority contract requirements.

07:56: Now, if you take that kind of percent, which sounds a little small, you take that percent

08:00: of these trillions of dollars in government contracts across ecology, start talking at a really big number.

08:06: You also just have lots of scandals with these contracting programs that can sat trust in government.

08:11: It's really common for white owned businesses to put up front companies owned by minorities

08:15: they just take a cock and then pass the contract on. And this anger is businesses owned by people

08:20: evolved different races because it's really tough to compete when there's such pervasive fraud.

08:23: And that has a cost for taxpayers for the business community and large and for everybody.

08:29: Now obviously there are some landmark cases relating to college admissions.

08:33: Has the Supreme Court ever weighed in specifically on minority contracting?

08:37: Yes, so it's been a while, but there were two big cases in the late 80s and in mid 1990s.

08:43: and Supreme Court tried to at least cabin or limit the programs.

08:47: The court basically said the government could only use minority contract if they're making

08:51: up for explicit discrimination in the past.

08:54: But instead of any of these programs, the case is sput this whole new industry to write

08:58: what are known as disparity studies, which try to show how some government easer was discriminatory

09:04: so they can keep using his race-based contracts.

09:07: By some estimates, just writing these studies would cost governments hundreds of millions of dollars.

09:12: Now, would a Supreme Court ruling that strikes down affirmative action in colleges directly affect these minority contracting programs?

09:20: Not directly, but down the road, it definitely could.

09:24: It could show the court was more interested in taking a further look at racial preferences in general.

09:28: And that means they might take a second look at how all these governments are still using

09:32: these minority contracting programs, despite their earlier attempts to limit.

09:36: And maybe it means over the long runs, Supreme Court could look at it ending them entirely.

09:41: All right, well, Judge, thanks so much for coming on and explaining that to us.

09:46: That was Judge Glock of the Manhattan Institute.

09:52: San Francisco's mayor has an expensive new plan to tackle homelessness, which has become a crisis for the city.

09:59: But the city is facing a budget deficit, and lots of homeless housing currently sits empty.

10:04: Daily wire investigator for Porter, Maray D'Alority is here with the details for us.

10:08: Married. Tell us about San Francisco's homeless displan.

10:11: Hi Georgia. So Mayor London breed once San Francisco to spend another 692.6 million on homelessness

10:18: next year as part of the city's five-year plan to reduce homelessness by half. The plan would

10:24: pay for 600 new shelter beds and 545 new housing units in the next year. The plan will also help

10:31: non-homeless people pay their rent so they don't become homeless. Those are the broad strokes,

10:35: but for the plan to move forward, the mayor and the San Francisco Board of Supervisors

10:39: have to agree on the specifics of the plan. Here's the problem though, San Francisco has a two-year

10:44: budget deficit of 744 million, and the mayor has to sign a balanced budget by August 1st.

10:51: This expensive homeless project will cut deep into the budget. This is in addition to a different

10:56: homeless policy breed recently rolled out, which is to have non-police personnel respond to certain

11:01: 911 calls. So does that apply to all 911 calls made in San Francisco or just homeless-related calls?

11:07: It's specifically for certain types of calls. Breeds goal is to pivot away from police as much

11:12: as possible when it comes to homelessness. This new program is called the Homeless

11:16: Engagement Assistant Response Team or Heart. The program will involve people from the homeless

11:22: nonprofit Urban Alchemy and they will respond to non-medical non-emergency 911 calls about homeless

11:28: people. There's also a pragmatic reason for the change. The police department is currently understaffed

11:33: by more than 500 officers. Back in 2020, breed cut $120 million from the San Francisco police

11:40: and sheriff's budgets. But by 2021, breed did a 180 on her decision. She made an emergency request

11:47: to the Board of Supervisors for more police money to crack down on crime, including open-air

11:51: drug dealing, car break-ins, and theft from stores. Lieutenant Tracy McCray of the San Francisco

11:57: police officers' association criticized the mayor for reversing her stance on police

12:01: funding. Here's McCray. Stop hating what you need. Obviously, no one else is going to go

12:07: and deal with this problem, but the police, right? You throw everything on us. So you know what?

12:13: Stop criticizing us. Stop trying to break us down because you know you need us to deal with it.

12:19: In March, Breed also pleaded for federal assistance to handle the crime and homelessness problems.

12:25: Now, I know homelessness spiked during COVID. What's the situation like now in San Francisco?

12:30: Well, it's gotten worse since the pandemic. About 38,000 people are homeless in the Bay Area on a

12:35: given night. That's up 35 percent since 2019. More than 7,000 people are homeless in San Francisco

12:41: itself. Right now, San Francisco has just over 3,000 shelter beds, but only about 2800 people

12:48: sleep in the shelter beds. The city also has more than 12,400 permanent supportive housing units,

12:54: but 825 of those units are sitting empty.

12:58: Circling back to the plan though, you said the mayor wants to create 600 new shelter beds

13:02: and more than 500 new housing units in the next year. If beds and housing are currently

13:08: standing empty, why does the mayor want more of them?

13:11: Well, it's not entirely clear, but some of the empty housing is due to bureaucratic delays.

13:16: Some homeless people who have been approved for housing have remained homeless because the city

13:21: is so slow about placing them in housing units.

13:24: Also, one of the persistent problems is that many homeless individuals

13:27: prefer not to use the services offered.

13:30: Sometimes they don't want a housing unit without a bathroom or an elevator.

13:33: So shelter beds and housing sit empty

13:35: while people choose to stay on the streets.

13:38: As you can imagine, the situation is extremely frustrating to residents.

13:42: Here's one man who spoke to local outlet, K-R-O-N.

13:45: I live in this city, I've born and raised in this city.

13:48: I have never seen anything like this in San Francisco.

13:51: California. May I read and promise you, you promise us, fix this.

13:56: Well, certainly one of the city's most stubborn problems.

13:59: Marade, thanks for reporting. Thanks, Georgia.

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