The American Dream Is in Doubt

Americans are having doubts about just what the American Dream is all about. If the Dream defines us, and I think it does, it is difficult to know who we are now. It is also difficult to support something that we have good reason to doubt. That doubt and the refusal to support explains why the American Dream has been hijacked, defunded and must be reclaimed..

The American Dream is the expectation of political liberty, economic opportunity, social mobility and a comfortable life for the citizen/worker. It springs from the Declaration of Independence's right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is bolstered by the abundance of nature, the American propensity for hard work and our natural optimism.

Optimism is part of our DNA. Americans have always rejected the pessimism of Thomas Hobbes, the founder of Anglo-Saxon individualism, who said that the natural life of man was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short." So what has changed or why is there foreboding and talk of "Reclaiming the American Dream," as though everyone believes we have already lost it?

The American Dream has always been with us; it goes back to at least Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton. But, surprisingly, as a specific phrase or idea, it was only popularized beginning in 1931. Like much that came out of the Depression and New Deal, the American Dream only took root in the popular culture in the 1950s and 60s. The Dream took on the material goals of the time: home ownership, educational attainment and a shared prosperity. The American Dream has always morphed to fit the times and has always been, until now, more than material plenty.

The problem now is, first, that the reality we face is changing. Then, there is no longer a consensus on what our Dream is and, finally, our intense focus on the Dream is changing us.

In the real world, we see an America of diminishing opportunity. Whether it is a new house, a good job or a first-in-the-family B.A., the achievement does not seem to deliver on its promise of freedom and security. Worse, Americans feel constrained as millions of homes are being foreclosed and the cost of college is putting it out of reach for the the families of skilled workers or middle management.

The recession might formally be over but it is not a shared austerity or prosperity. The political system that is supposed to protect us and the American Dream is not responding to our needs. It has become an alien entity.

At the same time, the Dream itself is changing and being corrupted. The most horrible degrading of the American Dream came when the country was attacked and the president told the people to go shopping. By that act, the Dream officially degenerated into consumerism: physical goods, a lifestyle, the novelty of fashion and the consumer experience itself.

In the process of consumerization, the Dream was privatized and individualized. This in turn led to a competitive consumerism that meant not just keeping up with the Joneses but one upping them.

This individualistic consumerism then fed back and changed us. Chasing after the American Dream became getting "the optimal hoard of positional goods." Positional goods are the status symbols where possession marks you as a comparative success. The irony is that mobility in America is now lower than it is in Canada and many European countries.

Americans now widely believe that merit, hard work and determination are not enough to get ahead. There is a pessimism that says the Dream will not be there for the next generation. The Dream has been hi-jacked.

These justified doubts about the American Dream arose from the debt-based, competitive consumerism that now masquerades as the Dream. The shift in the Dream really began in the1980s when wage levels became stagnant and all income increases were seized by the wealthy. Those who had money got more. This redistribution of income defunded the Dream and undermined our faith in a meritocracy not dependent on position or wealth. Wealth now matters; it is concentrated and it is soaking up the opportunity, upward mobility and security promised by the Dream.

The American Dream was always supported by an economy capable of providing the requisite resources. The economy still has the wealth to support the Dream but there is no political consensus about shared values and, therefore, how we distribute the wealth. Too many people are unwilling to share the Dream.

Our polarized and unstable political system can't agree on how much to spend on healthcare, national defense or education, much less on our Dream. We do know that when all of the increase in income has gone to the wealthy, the American Dream has been defunded.

Reclaiming the American Dream means being willing to share it again.