Excessive drinking creates countless personal disasters, including job losses, bankruptcies, suicides, divorces, crimes, lost friendships, and ruined family life. Nearly one in ten adults meets criteria for chronic alcohol abuse or alcohol addiction. One in every two Americans either has a drug problem or knows someone who does. Teenage use of drugs has doubled since 1992. Every day it seems there is more shocking news about young people killing, committing suicide, or doing both.
Most American children are in good shape.
But 1 in 4 adolescents abuses drugs, lags in school, or gets in trouble with the law. And an enormous number of kids experiment with drugs and alcohol, cheat at school, and are rude to adults. Most Americans say their family is life's most precious gift, but one that's wrapped in life's greatest worries. Two of every three Americans say they fret the most about family matters. America's public schools, which have been the principal means of transmitting common values from one generation to the next, have become battlefields.