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Simon Sinek claims in this video (at about 9:40min) that the suicide rates and the accidental drug overdoses among young people from the so-called "millennial" generation are increasing at the moment. Is that true? Are there reliable statistics backing this claim?

Ethunxxx
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  • Does he state how the rate is measured? # per year? If it's total suicides within any age group, not a rate in a given timeframe, then that's a number than can only grow. – PoloHoleSet Apr 11 '17 at 15:14
  • No, he doens't mention how it is measured. But I suppose he doesn't mean the cumulated numbers but a number per timeframe. – Ethunxxx Apr 11 '17 at 15:31
  • Depends on whether the aim is to honestly inform, or to misinform to sell product or further an agenda. :D – PoloHoleSet Apr 11 '17 at 15:43

1 Answers1

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Suicide: Yes (New York Times, study), but not just millennials:

Suicide in the United States has surged to the highest levels in nearly 30 years, a federal data analysis has found, with increases in every age group except older adults. The rise was particularly steep for women. It was also substantial among middle-aged Americans...

Accidental Drug Overdoses: Again Yes (New York Times), if by "millennial" you mean "young whites":

Drug overdoses are driving up the death rate of young white adults in the United States to levels not seen since the end of the AIDS epidemic more than two decades ago — a turn of fortune that stands in sharp contrast to falling death rates for young blacks, a New York Times analysis of death certificates has found.

Brythan
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ReasonablySkeptical
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    It's pretty disingenuous for him to say its a millennial thing. There is an age group that statistically dies by intentional self harm the most, this age group currently contains millennials. In 2006 the total was 1.6% now its 1.9% so its not a huge surge, just funny business with statistics. 11. http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/3303.02015?OpenDocument – daniel Apr 11 '17 at 12:14
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    @Daniel I agree that it's disingenuous, and I also think it's somewhat deceptive to ignore groups other than young whites. However, 1.6 to 1.9 is 16%, which I'd call a significant increase - not a "huge surge", but definitely increasing. Wouldn't you? – ReasonablySkeptical Apr 11 '17 at 13:17
  • Well I think its an interesting question which is why I'm here :D I'd say it's an increase, of 0.3% – daniel Apr 11 '17 at 13:26
  • I'm also not sure how you get 16% as the % increase either, but 0.3% increase for me seems like the rational way to put it. – daniel Apr 11 '17 at 13:40
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    @Daniel 1.6% and 1.9% are 16 and 19 from a thousand, yes? So what's the percentage increase from 16 to 19? Hint: it's 15.7895%, which I rounded up. That's the _rational_ way to describe it, because that gives you the increase in people affected. – ReasonablySkeptical Apr 11 '17 at 14:13
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    you mean percentage increase? (1.9-1.6)/1.6 *100 =18.75% ??, I mean its fuzzy descriptions all round and language that is making a difference sound bigger. Anyways like they say when one person dies it's a tragedy when a thousand die it's hilarious. – daniel Apr 11 '17 at 15:38
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    @Daniel d'OH, you're right, I did it wrong. But you're wrong, thinking of it as 18.75 % instead of your 0.3% does _NOT_ make the difference sound bigger. It makes it sound like what it is: the difference in the number of people being affected. The percent change in the percentage is a noncommunicative number: numerically valid, but disconnected from the reality under discussion. – ReasonablySkeptical Apr 11 '17 at 16:47
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    Both of you are arguing statistics, but I'd like to argue semantics - how much of that 0.3 increase is just from an increasing *pool* of Millennials? – Zibbobz Apr 12 '17 at 13:58
  • I wouldn't use the word millennial in a serious conversation about anything, also the statistics I dug up are the % out of Australian deaths that are from self harm, so as deaths from other causes decrease (safer roads, better hospitals, less bear attacks) this number would also increase. Contrary to that the raw numbers went from 2,118 to 3,027 in the 9 years, but something to think about for the other sources. – daniel Apr 13 '17 at 11:30
  • @CPerkins I was looking at the statistics from the sources in your article and they look like they are in the same ball park, from 1.4% in 2006 to 1.6% in 2015. A positive note is that total deaths per year per capita has actually gone down a tiny bit. – daniel Apr 13 '17 at 12:27