This paper envisions child care problems in the year 2000 and explores their relationship to policies of today. The population entering parenting age in the year 2000 will bear the scars of the inadequate child care policies of the 1980's. New poor and black parents--many of them born to adolescent mothers in the early 1980's--will have been…

Children growing up today face unprecedented perils and problems, and for many children the world frequently seems to be an unpredictable place. Pressures on children come from a variety of sources, such as family, peer relationships, and changes in society. (JD)

The mere act of living in today's society is dangerous to the health and well-being of children and adolescents. The concept of the socially toxic environment is offered as a parallel to the environmental movement's analysis of physical toxicity. Social life is more risky than it was just 40 years ago, and the level of social and cultural poison…