If the recent Anne Case-Angus Deaton research is correct, America’s former middle class is dying, and not just metaphorically. 

While other ethnic and racial groups are holding steady or making gains, caucasians in the U.S. are perishing in middle age at an increasingly alarming rate. Suicides have spiked as have overdoses. Why this ugly turn? Perhaps something to do with the financial collapse of 2008 and the very lopsided recovery? Maybe the decline of the white working class in a globalized, technologized world minus the safety net of unions and progressive taxes? Could it just be the cheaper “weapons” (e.g., opioids) at hand?

From a Centers for Disease Control release:

The findings show that two distinct but intertwined trends are driving America’s overdose epidemic: a 15-year increase in deaths from prescription opioid pain reliever overdoses as a result of misuse and abuse, and a recent surge in illicit drug overdoses driven mainly by heroin. Both of these trends worsened in 2014.

More than six out of 10 drug overdose deaths in 2014 involved opioids, including opioid pain relievers and heroin. The largest increase in opioid overdose deaths involved synthetic opioids (not including methadone), which were involved in 5,500 deaths in 2014, nearly twice as many as the year before. Many of these overdoses are believed to involve illicitly-made fentanyl, a short-acting opioid.

In addition, heroin-related death rates increased 26 percent from 2013–2014, totaling 10,574 deaths in 2014. Past misuse of prescription opioids is the strongest risk factor for heroin initiation and use—especially among people who became dependent upon or abused prescription opioids in the past year. The increased availability of heroin, its relatively low price (compared to prescription opioids), and high purity appear to be major drivers of the upward trend in heroin use, overdoses, and deaths.•