[Garth Tater]

Thus, addition to pain killers is cultural and specific to certain areas around the country. These people are letting themselves become addicted to opioids and becoming junkies.

There's nothing like a good job and a good woman to keep a young man heading down the proper path in life. As a 35 year resident of the Huntington W.Va. area I can tell you good jobs are very, very hard to find - and a woman can easily do better on her own with govt assistance than she can hooking up with a man with a minimum wage job.

Yes, drug addiction is a choice but it's a choice most young men would never be in the position to have to make if the factories hadn't been off-shored. Of the five close friends my son had growing up here two are dead from drugs, two have decent jobs and one works in the underground economy. NONE of them were bad kids growing up.

[Timpanagos1]

“Yes, drug addiction is a choice but it’s a choice most young men would never be in the position to have to make if the factories hadn’t been off-shored. Of the five close friends my son had growing up here two are dead from drugs, two have decent jobs and one works in the underground economy. NONE of them were bad kids growing up.”

The relationship between drug addiction and the economics of certain areas is a two way street, in that yes, lack of job opportunity in a geographic area can cause higher rates of drug addition, but high rates of drug addiction in a geographic area leads to a lack of good workers and companies do not want to open up shops.

That same situation is true for the South Side of Chicago and the towns in West Virginia.

Speaking of WV did you see this piece?

Drug firms poured 780M painkillers into WV amid rise of overdoses - See more at: http://www.wvgazettemail.com/news-health/20161217/drug-firms-poured-780m-painkillers-into-wv-amid-rise-of-overdoses#sthash.403EkXBB.dpuf