The Morning Meeting with Al Tompkins is a daily Poynter briefing of story ideas worth considering and more timely context for journalists, written by senior faculty Al Tompkins. Sign up here to have it delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.
If America is going to get inflation under control, it will have to grapple with the No. 1 contributor to the January inflation increase: rent/shelter costs.
Rent accounts for about 32% of the Consumer Price Index equation but rent increases represented more than half of the inflation rate in January. In other words, rent costs outweigh other rising costs. Given how much of your income goes to rent, overall inflation rates will remain high unless we get rent prices under control. The trend is steadily up.
(Trading Economics)
Some of the cities with the fastest rising rents are cities you might not expect to make the list, like Indianapolis, Cincinnati, St Louis and Cleveland.
(CoStar Group)
(CoStar Group)
One other notable trend that you will find in the CPI data this week: Used car prices have dropped more than 11% in the last year.
Explore more on why rent prices are so high:
Our teens are not fine: alarming new CDC data
New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that in 2021, nearly six in 10 teenage girls said they felt persistent sadness. One in three teen girls said they considered suicide. The rate among boys was high, too, but half as high as teen girls. The report said:
As we saw in the 10 years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health among students overall continues to worsen, with more than 40% of high school students feeling so sad or hopeless that they could not engage in their regular activities for at least two weeks during the previous year—a possible indication of the experience of depressive symptoms. We also saw significant increases in the percentage of youth who seriously considered suicide, made a suicide plan, and attempted suicide.
In 2021, nearly 30% of female students drank alcohol during the past 30 days. Almost 20% of female students experienced sexual violence by anyone during the past year and 14% had ever been physically forced to have sex. Although these numbers are high, the rates of poor mental health and suicidal thoughts and behaviors are even higher.
In 2021, almost 60% of female students experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness during the past year and nearly 25% made a suicide plan.
The CDC said the mental health of young LGBTQ+ people is even more concerning:
LGBQ+ students and those who have any same-sex partners were more likely than their peers to have used or misused all substances included in this report (i.e., ever used select illicit drugs, ever or current prescription opioid misuse, and current alcohol, marijuana, and electronic vapor product use). They were also significantly more likely to experience all forms of violence.
The differences in terms of mental health, compared to their peers, are substantial. Close to 70% of LGBQ+ students experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness during the past year and more than 50% had poor mental health during the past 30 days. Almost 25% attempted suicide during the past year.
There are some differences in the mental health of teens by race:
Although Black students were less likely to report poor mental health and persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness than some other groups of students, they were significantly more likely than Asian, Hispanic and White students to have attempted suicide.
See reporting from NBC News, The New York Times, Fox News, NPR, PBS and CNN.
A significant drop in teens having sex
The same CDC survey says the percentage of teens who are having sex is dropping. It continues a steady decline year after year for a decade. But among those who are sexually active, only 52% report using a condom during their last sexual intercourse.
(CDC)
The percentage of heterosexual and LGBTQ+ students who said they were sexually active is about the same (29% and 33%, respectively.) While Asian students were the least likely to be sexually active there is little statistical difference between white, Black, Hispanic and multiracial students.
Where did the phrase ‘throwing my hat in the ring’ come from?
Former South Carolina Republican Gov. Nikki Haley announced that she is running for the Republican nomination for president and anchors everywhere told viewers that she was “throwing her hat into the ring.” It made me wonder where the strange phrase came from since few candidates since John Kennedy have worn hats.
The phrase has roots in the sport of boxing during a time when you could throw your hat into the ring if you wanted to fight somebody and a referee would acknowledge the challenge. English-Grammar-Lessons.com adds:
“The 1805 issue of The Sporting Magazine: “Belcher appeared confident of success [in a boxing match], and threw his hat into the ring, as an act of defiance to his antagonist.”
The Mirror of Taste, published in 1810: “A young fellow threw his hat into the ring and followed, when the lame umpire called out “a challenge,” and proceeded to equip the challenger for the game. … He then walked round the ring till a second hat was thrown in, and the umpire called out, “the challenge is answered.”
Word Histories says the first reference may be from 1804.
The first reference connecting the “hat in the ring” to presidential politics may have been Teddy Roosevelt who, in 1912, told a journalist, “My hat is in the ring; the fight is on and I’m stripped to the buff.” Roosevelt was an avid boxer so he would have been familiar with the phrase. He also is the only president to hold a brown belt in judo.
I guess it is time for Haley to “hit the campaign trail.” She will do well to remember that “the only poll that counts is the one on Election Day,” but she is a “proven fighter for the people,” and will fight the notion that she is a “career politician.” She will remind you that her “name is on the ballot, but this election is all about you,” she will fight for the “working people and middle-class families,” and, as we know, “it will all depend on turnout.” She will learn that campaigns “are not all about money” and, even when you are behind, “every vote counts.”
Incidentally, the phrase “Let’s make America great again!” was first used by Ronald Reagan in 1980, then by Bill Clinton in 1992 before Donald Trump claimed the phrase to be his own in 2016.
Didn’t get enough? Go here to read a year-by-year list of the political cliches that became campaign themes.
