The Press-Dispatch
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/1471357
Does "gender-affirming care" for trans kids actually prevent suicide? Comparing of people who sought and received puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones with those un- able to receive them doesn't give the full picture. When faced with divisive political arguments, the Left has a bad habit of putting on its figurative lab coat, conducting lousy research, and then declaring that Science has resolved the dispute in its favor. This tenden- cy was on full display during the pandemic: If you didn't obey faux-sci- entific orders on masks, social-dis- tancing, or school closures, you must have wanted people to die. This political abuse of science is emerging again on the issue of gen- der dysphoria in adolescents. The Biden administration and its allies are declaring that if "gender-affirm- ing" care in the form of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones is not widely and readily available to trans-identifying children, young people trapped in bodies that do not conform with their declared sex will despair and commit suicide. Recently, former White House spokesperson Jen Psaki reacted to an Alabama law that restricts prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to minors as in- terfering with "medically necessar y, life-saving healthcare." These comments echo those of advocates like Sarah Harte, who declared that "laws and systems bar- ring gender-affirming healthcare will contribute to higher rates of signifi- cant mental health problems, includ- ing deaths by suicide." State policymakers in California, Washington, and elsewhere are re- sponding to laws, such as the one in Alabama, by advancing legislation that makes puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones more accessible young. But–déjà vu–the science used to justify these claims and policy changes is ex- tremely weak. Only a handful of stud- ies examine the relation- ship between cross-sex hormone treatments and suicide risks that com- pare outcomes for teen- agers who received such care to those who sought it but did not receive it. No study uses a causal re- search design, such as a randomized controlled trial, which is typically re- quired for approving drugs. Instead, many of these studies compare mi- nors who received inter ventions to those who were unable to get them and find lower rates of contemplating suicide. There are many defects in this research. First, these studies rely upon sur veys of trans-identifying adults recruited from trans support and advocacy groups, so they are not representative of all people who have experienced gender dysphoria as ad- olescents. In particular, these stud- ies are less likely to include people who resolved these issues without medical inter vention and people who had regret about receiving puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. In addition, comparing of people who sought and received puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones with those unable to receive them doesn't give the full picture. One of the requirements for receiving these inter ventions is being labeled as psy- chologically stable. So the fact that, suicidal ideation is higher among people who tried but could not get these drugs may be the result of their being disqualified because they were psychologically unstable when they sought them. And existing stud- ies make no effort to control for prior mental health conditions. In a new report re- leased by the Heritage Foundation, we con- duct a more rigorous examination of this issue. We find that eas- ing access to cross-sex treatments without pa- rental consent signifi- cantly increases suicide rates. We take advantage of a natural policy experiment that results from the fact that some states have a le- gal provision that allows minors to access medical care without parental consent, at least under certain cir- cumstances, while other states have no such provision. This variation in state policies pre- dates the introduction of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones as medical inter ventions, which began in the U.S. around 2010 and acceler- ated around 2015. We compare annual youth suicide rates in states that allow minors to access care without parental consent to states that do not. The data clearly show no difference in youth suicide rates between these two groups of states for over a decade before 2010, when this use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones begins. Around that time, a difference in sui- cide rates emerges and the gap ac- celerates after 2015 when cross-sex treatments become more common. There is a 14% increase in suicide rates among young people by 2020 in states that have a provision allowing minors to access care without paren- The Swamp vs. America: Biden policies are making America poorer I've been struck by the opinion di- vide on the state of the economy be- tween people with real jobs in America and the elite opinions in Washington. Gallup and other primar y and rep- utable pollsters find that the public is ver y worried. About 2 in 10 respon- dents rate the U.S. economy as good or great. That compares with nearly 6 in 10 people who thought the econ- omy was good or great throughout Donald Trump's presidency. In oth- er words, three times the number of people liked the way things were going under Trump policies than feel the same way about Bidenomics. The Washington Post, The Atlantic and other rags inside the Beltway -- the one place on the planet that gets richer when the rest of the country gets poor- er -- have been wondering why the pub- lic is so down in the dumps. The stan- dard view inside the Beltway is that the public just doesn't appreciate how well the country is doing. They say the job market is robust, and that is true. The public has made a lot of money in the stock market. Also true, until recently. And we are doing better than France and Italy and Germany. To listen to this chorus, which in- cludes the White House economics team, you'd think we should be partying like it's 1999! President Joe Biden says he's abandoned "trickle-down econom- ics." Instead, he's setting the course for a sturdier and more robust economy. But rather than "building back better," we'd probably be much better off if he'd just left things the way he found them. The public is right to have its "spi- dey senses tingling." Unfortunately, it feels to many like we're on the beach and the winds are calm, but a tsunami is coming. They are right to be afraid. Over the past two and a half years, since the start of COVID, we have spent and bor- rowed in Washington $5 trillion we don't have. Our welfare and give- away programs have chased millions out of the workforce for two years now and into the hammock. Free rent. Free medical care. Free food. No need to rush back to work. As The New York Times put it recently, Biden is imple- menting "cradle to grave" government. We've practiced a crank idea called Modern Monetar y Theor y that instructed us that we could go on spending and borrowing without worr ying that the bubble will pop. People like Janet Yellen, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders actually drank this Kool-Aid. But guess what? The bubble's al- ready popping. Over the last year, the inflation rate of 8.3% is outpacing the wage increases of 5.4%, and that's been the case for virtually ever y month that Biden has been in office. By contrast, The Wall Street Journal reports that wages outpaced inflation ever y year that Trump was in office. So consider family incomes. Under Trump, median household incomes rose by about $6,000. And that wasn't for the rich. Working-class people saw those giant gains in living standards and purchasing power. Under Biden, we don't have the census num- bers yet, but based on the wage and inflation numbers, it is likely that the typical middle-class family has lost somewhere between $2,000 and $4,000. And this is sup- posed to be a recovery. The losses worsen month after month, and inflation stays above the wage gains. In other words, the public isn't just imagining that the economy and family finances are heading south. They are. This was so predictable due to the overspending and the war on Amer- ican energy that only a liberal with ideological blinders on couldn't see it coming. But instead of calling off the failed economic strategy, Biden, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer are still peddling green energy and the $3 trillion Build Back Better bill. No wonder the stock market and pen- sion funds have lost an estimated $7 trillion in the last three months. No one in the White House or the media will admit any of this. They're doing just fine, thank you. It seems the only thing that will turn things around is a regime change. Stephen Moore is a senior fellow at Freedom Works. He is also author of the new book: "Govzilla: How The Relentless Growth of Government Is Devouring Our Economy." Submit Letters to the Editor: Letters must be signed and received by noon on Mondays. Email: editor@pressdispatch.net or bring in a hard copy: 820 E. Poplar Street, Petersburg OPINION Race for the Cure By Star Parker Give Me a Break John Stossel Eye on the Economy By Stephen Moore C-2 Wednesday, June 22, 2022 The Press-Dispatch US inflation starts in Washington, not Moscow President Joe Biden spoke at the Port of Los Angeles the other day and addressed the issue foremost on the minds of Americans today -- inflation. And in the spirit of a tried and true lib- eral, he blamed everyone in the world for a problem that he is responsible for. Apparently, our president believes that Vladimir Putin is running Amer- ica. "We've never seen anything like Putin's tax on both food and gas. … Putin's price hike is hitting America hard…I'm doing ever ything in my power to blunt Putin's price hike and bring down the cost of gas and food." Speaking on CNN, Treasur y Sec- retar y Janet Yellen showed she has a little more integrity than her boss by admitting the inflation situation was mismanaged and she was wrong about what was happening. "I think I was wrong about the path that inflation would take," she said, re- ferring to her observations last year that escalating inflation was a "small risk" and wouldn't "be a problem." The president does, of course, see that Putin has some accomplices in rav- aging Americans with escalating prices. Among these, per Biden, are the ports, the supply chain, foreign ship- pers and the oil industr y. "One thing I want to say about the oil companies," said Biden: "they have 9,000 permits to drill. They're not drill- ing...Why aren't they drilling? Because they make more money not producing more oil. The price goes up." Our president demonstrates that his understanding of economics is less than any college freshman. Oil markets are global and competi- tive. No one company, even a huge com- pany like ExxonMobil, controls the mar- ket. Even the biggest company is just one participant in a competitive market. Unless our president wants to argue that American oil producers are a cartel, like OPEC, that controls about 40% of total world oil production, no one company causes the price to move. Every compa- ny is a price taker, not price maker. Whatever the price is, companies will produce and sell as much as they can to maximize their current reve- nues. To suggest other wise is pure economic ignorance. Unfortunately, the late, great No- bel prize winning economist Milton Friedman, who explained the causes of inflation, has been washed away in today's woke culture. Friedman's famous observation was that "inflation is always and ev- erywhere a monetary phenomenon, in the sense that it is and can be pro- duced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output." Friedman is unpopular with liberals because once it is understood that in- flation is the result of the government printing excessive amounts of money, we understand that inflation can only be caused by government, because only government can print money. Once it is clear that only govern- ment actions, in the way of creating excessive amounts of money, cause inflation, then those in government cannot blame others, as our presi- dent is now doing. Economists Steve Hanke and John Greenwood, looking at the rate at which the Biden government was creating money, wrote in the Wall Street Journal in July 2021, "By the end of the year, the year-over-year inflation rate will be at least 6% and possibly as high as 9%." Clearly, they were right on target. Responding to Biden's recent ex- planations about inflation, Hanke and Greenwood point out, "China, Japan and Switzerland also face elevated oil prices, supply-chain problems and fallout from the war in Ukraine, but their annual inflation rates are 2.1%, 2.5% and 2.5%, respectively. They have avoided the ravages of inflation be- cause their central banks haven't pro- duced excessive quantities of money." If there is anything we should be grateful for today, given what is happen- ing, it is that Biden and the Democrats in Congress failed in their Build Back Better plan to layer another $5 trillion in new government expenditures into our economy. Less government spending and more honesty, responsibility and clear thinking is our only path to emerg- ing from today's economic chaos. Star Parker is president of the Cen- ter for Urban Renewal and Education and host of the weekly television show "Cure America with Star Parker." The cost of rent control Rents have reached record highs. But have no fear, renters! In the Min- nesota cities of St. Paul and Minneap- olis, progressives persuaded people to vote for rent control. That'll punish those greedy land- lords! Except, profits are what persuade builders to build things. When prof- its are high, other builders build. That's what creates more housing and, eventually, lower rents. Put limits on prices -- and those greedy landlords find other places to build. Whenever rent control is imposed, the supply of rental housing declines. Lots of studies show that. But the activists don't want to hear it. "We don't need more studies! We don't need to collect more data! We need action now!" says Claire Ber- gren of Home to Stay, Minneapolis, in my new video. St. Paul's rent control is uniquely strict. Most cities exempt new con- struction; not St. Paul. They imposed it on future apartments. "This is such a step backwards," says Salim Furth, economist at the Mercatus Center. "The market is going to shrink, and quality is going to fall." After all, if you are a builder, "Why would you enter a market where it seems like the government is active- ly tr ying to hurt you?" asks Furth. St. Paul developers can simply move just a few blocks over to twin city Minneapolis. Minneapolis also voted to allow rent control. But they haven't yet imposed it. That's a reason builders still build in Minneapolis. Building permits rose 65% there last winter, while in St. Paul, they fell 61%. St. Paul mayor Melvin Carter, who voted for rent control, has suddenly had second thoughts. Now he's real- ized, "Turning off our supply of new housing would be disastrous." Have the other progressive pol- iticians learned from St. Paul's mis- take? No. They live in a fair y world. They never learn. "I want us to follow (St. Paul's) lead," says Minneapolis City Council Member Aisha Chughtai, the rare rent control supporter who would talk to me. She claimed that rent control won't dr y up the supply of housing. "In other cities, we have continued to see development," Chughtai says. "What cities?" I ask. "San Francisco," she says. What? San Francisco!? What an absurd example. San Francisco is famous for its housing crisis. "Builders still build in Minneapo- lis," I tell her. "But you're not going to get apartments by pushing this." Here she pauses for a full 17 sec- onds -- an eternity in a video inter- view -- before answering, "I'm going to maintain that guaranteeing hous- ing for people and making sure that they can stay in their homes matters more than anything else." That may be work for insiders like her. Renters will be able to stay in run-down apartments forever. But newcomers will have no chance. "I live in the only town in Mar yland that has rent control," says Furth. "We've had it since the '70s. We have not built a single multifamily build- ing since that law was passed." Chughtai is a socialist. That helps explain why she doesn't understand how houses, apartments, and most ever ything else get built. I asked the city councilwoman where socialism has worked (it hasn't). After another long pause, she an- swers, "I'm doing a just fine job of representing my community." She isn't. The late economist Wal- ter Williams explained, "Short of ae- rial bombardment, the best way to de- stroy a city is through rent controls." Rent control once destroyed much of my town, New York City. Landlords, who couldn't raise rents enough to make a profit, stopped making repairs. Then many burned down their own buildings to collect insurance. Between 1970 and 1980, much of the Bronx ended up losing 97% of their buildings to fire and abandonment. Under rent control, says Furth, "Landlords just don't reinvest." Today, rents are up, and that's hard. But in the long run, rent controls will only make the problem worse. John Stossel is creator of Stossel TV and author of "Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media." See KIDS on page 3