We Are Breaking Our Young People. And Then We Are Medicating Them for It.

We talk about young adults as if they are the future. But look at how we treat them. Look at the weight we place on their shoulders and then look at the shock on our faces when they collapse under it.

The numbers are devastating. Among adults under 30, the rate of depression has more than doubled since 2017, climbing from just 13% to a staggering 26.7% today. More than one in four young people in this country is currently suffering from depression, a rate that has only continued to rise. And how does society respond? With pills. We are raising a generation on antidepressants as we drain every last drop of hope and security from their lives.

What is making them so sick? Let me name it plainly. Let us start with the price of an education. A young person is told that college is the only path to a good life, so they sign up for loans, only to graduate with an average federal student loan balance of nearly $40,000. That is a record high. Before they have even earned their first real paycheck, they are already buried in a mountain of debt with interest rates that make escape nearly impossible.

Then they try to find a place to live. The average U.S. rent is now $1,636 per month, and in major cities, it is even worse. Approximately half of all young adult households now spend more than 30% of their income on housing, a category the government defines as cost-burdened. Among young renters who do not earn much, a full 60% are spending an even higher, crippling share of their income on rent alone.

Then there is the job market. The unemployment rate for those aged 16 to 24 has shot above 10%, far outpacing job losses in the rest of the workforce. Companies complain that young people do not want to work, even though wages have remained so stagnant that a single job often cannot pay the bills, forcing millions into the side-hustle economy just to survive. And there is a price for that struggle. A recent survey found that 73% of Gen Z workers with side jobs are suffering from burnout. Nearly one in three say their extra work has wrecked their mental health.

Add it all up. $40,000 in debt. Rent that eats your entire paycheck. A wage that does not move. A society that says grind harder instead of we will fix this. Why would anyone be surprised that tens of millions of young people are depressed? It is not an illness. It is a natural, sane response to a system that has stacked the deck against them.

And yet, we ignore them. We ignore them just like we ignore the nearly 37 million Americans living in official poverty. We ignore them just like we ignore the 771,000 Americans currently experiencing homelessness, the highest number ever recorded by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. How low are we becoming as a society that we can look at these numbers, these living, breathing people, and do nothing but blame them for not trying hard enough?

To every student who is reading this: I see what you are carrying. I know you are exhausted. I know you feel like you are taking medication just to be able to tolerate a world that seems set against you. You are not broken. You are not lazy. And you are not alone.

I want you to know that I am running for president, not as a politician who sees you as a vote to be counted, but as a candidate who sees you as a whole human being worthy of a future. If you will allow me, I will give you a seat at the table. Not a token seat in the back where you can be seen but not heard. A real seat. And I will listen to every single thing you want to say.

It is your future. It is your lives we are destroying. And it is your voice that must lead the way out. So until we change these frameworks, until the cost of living matches the wage for living, until a college degree does not come with a life sentence of debt, I will be right there beside you, fighting for the world you deserve.