The kids are all right, but we're not!

[elfs]

Among Americans ages 35 to 54:

• Deaths from illicit drug overdose is 5½ times higher this year than in 1975
• Are 30% more likely than people aged 15 through 19 to be killed in an automotive accident
• Are twice as likely to be binge drinkers than a college-age adult
• Are more likely than college-age adults to contract HIV
• Are twice as likely to commit a felony than they were in 1975

Looking through the comparisons, I see some interesting cherry-picking of comparitives, but overall this op-ed in the New York Times suggests that it is not children who are "at risk," but their parents, going through some sort of bizarre midlife crisis.

Comments

[antonia-tiger.livejournal.com]

OK, Elf, wake up and smell the statistical cheating.

15 through 19 is a 5-year age-cohort. 35 to 54 is 20 years, roughly four times as many people. So, like for like, you're only a third as lifely to get killed in an auto accident.

Is it a similar age-range for college-age adults--same problem for the HIV figure and the binge drinkers, and most of your college-age Americans can't legally buy alcohol anyway.

Now, the illicit drug overdose figure is a like-for-like, by the look of it, but I'll bet that in 1975 the drug use in that age range was pretty slight. It cattched the reefer madness generation, not the hippies, and that age-range now is catching people with a vert different history. So there's a higher rate, but how do the numbers compare.

As for the feleny figure, it looks like-for-like on the people, but has the law changed? Maybe some law has a value limit--has that tracked inflation?

There's so much obviously bogus about the comparisons that, when there isn't something obvious, I can't help but wonder.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm fully cognizant of the cheating. Still, it's a tantalizing bit of suggestiveness, don't you think? I kinda like the notion that not only are the kids alright, but that my generation isn't sure what to do with itself.

[omahas.livejournal.com]

I took a look through that op-ed piece, and found that much of what he said was based on several things:

1. comparing raw numbers of the much smaller group of teenagers (14 to 19) and then saying that because the raw numbers of people 35 to 54 was higher, that meant the middle-aged were more at risk...this is bad number crunching to say the least.

2. comparing percentage numbers between the group of teenagers or young adults that had a significantly smaller amount of time to experience the act than the older adults (35 to 54) and claiming that because it's higher, percentage-wise, in the older adults, that means we're more at risk. 'Scuse me?

3. Not recognizing that between 1975 and today, what is decided to be included in a particular set of statistics has changed, and claiming that means that the statistics can still be comparable. sigh.

Op-eds like these irritate me, because they always show that people just want to press their own reality down other people's throats.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

The current children and younger adults are Homelanders and Millennials, respectively. Their parents are Boomers and Slackers. So this is what we would expect -- Millennials are in the same part of the cycle as Greatest and Silent Generation, respectively, and thus duplicate their behavior to some extent.

Pop Psychology and Sociology

[(Anonymous)]

Huh? My pop sociology book says that the current 15-19 year olds are on the cusp between Arschtootlers and Poopdytoos, which places them at high risk of being numerically outnumbered in all interesting topics.

OK, that was just a bad joke. The real issue here is what signs the outer planets have been in.

Re: Pop Psychology and Sociology

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

Eh, I've read up on generational dynamics, and it seems to have at least consdierable descriptive value for American history, and the histories of some other nations. Much more so than astrologly, and there is also a proposed mechanism for its operation, unlike asrology.