"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance," the old bumper sticker says. Yet for decades, national and state lawmakers have flaunted their ignorance of what makes a good society by stupidly shortchanging our investment in our youngest minds. At the same time, corporate and governmental policymakers have intentionally rigged our economic and political systems to hold down workers' incomes even while their living expenses rise. The result is that mothers and fathers alike are herded into whatever jobs or jobettes are available — just to make ends meet. This leaves young children to ... what?

Let's be clear: Caring for children is expensive. Kids are labor-intensive — assuming, that is, the goal is not merely to keep the little creatures watered, fed and restrained, but actually cared for intellectually, emotionally and socially. Today, only the wealthy can purchase primo attention from private providers and, thanks to ever-attentive lawmakers, the rich even enjoy a special tax-break loophole for their nannies. But workaday families — especially the majority stranded on the lower rungs of the economic ladder — are mostly on their own when it comes to child care.