Why do people use drugs? It’s one of those neglected questions with answers right in front of our noses. We just refuse to look. [Scientific American and Kaisier Health News]

Getting high—and overdosing—is after all, as American as apple pie. Over 46 million people in the U.S. have an alcohol- or drug-use disorder. Everyone knows someone who died, or who lost a son or daughter, mother or father, to a drug overdose, one of the 100,000-plus now yearly recorded nationwide.

Lost in today’s raging debate over drug policy and how to curb this spiraling mortality is the deep malaise that lies at the root of substance use in America. We are stuck on a loop, veering from “drug war” to legalization to backlash against legalization, without a record of improving lives and setting people on a successful path of recovery. And that’s because we are frankly unwilling to fix the economic cruelty that drives and keep people locked in dangerous drug use.

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