Tuesday, September 20, 2011

The death of the American Dream????

What was it?  Is it gone?  The real news according to the Onion

Your thoughts?

13 comments:

  1. The American Dream is the idea that you are going to make a better life for yourself and for your children. I don't believe that the American dream is dead but it has significantly changed. We still have the idea of making a better life for ourselves and our children but we are not necessarily starting from the beginning with nothing like our grandparents (or parents) did.

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  2. The American Dream is the belief that through hard work and perseverance, we as Americans can achieve anything/the life we dreamed of. I believe that the American Dream is still out there, it is instilled in us from a young age to achieve what we dream for and hard work will be the ticket to it. but somewhere along the road we lose sight of what our American Dream is and how we get it. it is a very tough path to get what we dream of in American today but still hard work and perseverance will be the way to get it.

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  3. I don't find that the American Dream is dead, per se. It is still possible for people to exhibit economic mobility and obtain that house in the suburbs with 2.5 kids and a white picket fence.

    However, the Dream is dead in the sense that it is widely available to each US citizen. More and more the Dream is viewed as an exception rather than a large possibility. Mobility is largely limited and the Great Compression that could be seen in the early 1940s has given way to a Great Divergence where the rich get richer and the rest of America is left outside of the fence.

    In a word, the American Dream has become more literal (i.e. it is more of a Dream than a possible reality).

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  4. The dream in America today is to get a college education and get a good quality job. The outlook on life has changed since the 1950's. The dream back then was to start a family and put up a white picket fence. You really don't see that in todays day and age.

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  5. The American Dream is the belief that anyone can go from rags to riches in the course of their lifetime. It is the ability to have limitless success as long as you are willing to work hard and put in the time necessary. I do not believe that the American Dream is dead. People from other countries still come to american for the american dream, but i think it has changed for people born here. It seems to be more about quick success rather than life long achievement.

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  6. I am a strong believer in the American dream. I do not think it has changed from its original form. The American dream to me is that through hard work and perseverance anything is possible in this country. I had many classmates in high school who struggled to stay in school and attain a better life than their immigrant parents were able to afford for them. One example is a good friend of mine who immigrated to Los Angeles in 9th grade. His parents, who were respected professionals in Bangladesh took 3rd shift jobs in convenient stores. They were able to send all three of their kids to UC Berkeley and UCLA. The american dream is not easy to obtain, it never has been. But through hard work, it is still, as it always has been, attainable.

    Even sitting in this classroom, how many people have student loans, federal aid? How many people in Botswana who can't afford college can still go to college? Is that not a piece of the America dream?

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  7. I still believe the american dream is here, instead of the past when you were forced to work hard and had no alternatives other than luck, today you are bombarded with "shortcuts" that get you things fast but with dire consequences. But, I believe its still here because all of today's plastic culture and instant gratification is a choice that you make, YOU can still make the choice to work hard now and save and make wise decisions, and not fall into taking short cuts to reach it, therefore still leaving you the the "dream of the past"

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  8. to me the american dream is all about the ability to move freely in the webbings of a society, to be able to pick yourself up by your own "bootstraps" and move up in the social ladder. According to the readings done this past week the american dream has been morphed through time. for the past generations the dream was more about being able to be in control of ones own finances, today it seems to be more about the owning of goods. The american dream has been commercialized... we have come to see items as representing our status. the dream is not dead, to an extent the basic desire is still there, but overall it's just changed.

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  9. The American dream is the belief that one can come to America and live a good life. America is after all the land of opportunity. I think over the years people have come to believe that it is something that should just be handed to them or something that is just assumed. I dont think the American dream is dead, but I do think people need to remember that it comes from hard work.

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  10. The American Dream is the idea that you can make your life better by moving up in social classes, and each generation becoming more and more successful. I do not believe that the American Dream is dead it is just becoming harder and harder to achieve. Everyone wants to become better but it requires hard work. It is becoming highly competitive. However, since children are not starting out where their parents or grandparents did they don't quite have the same work ethic.

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  11. It seems like the American Dream used to mean working hard to make a living and support your family. But now it almost seems like the American Dream is having a huge house, flashy cars, and a corner office. It's not that the American Dream is dead, but I think we as American's must try and get away from the materialistic dream and back to the hard working, old-fashioned dream.

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  12. The American Dream is the idea that every individual can pursue their own goals and aspirations, as long as it is not a detriment to others. In the past, this consisted of the typical family lifestyle where one would go to school, get married, have children, and have a job. In recent years, due to the economic recession people are not able to achieve this dream because they cannot find jobs that they want or for which they are qualified. As a member of the younger generation, we need to decide what is our new "American dream".

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  13. The American dream is the endless possibility to ameliorate one's status and to support one's family independently. It's the manifestation of the basic equation of hard work + dream = a dream come true. This realization of desire is highly costly so one must be totally devoted to his commitment.
    I believe that the American dream has been on the verge of disappearing as a result of the current American lifestyle. Americans now days expect things to be provided for them because they believe that they deserve it. They believe that it is morally right for everyone to have the opportunity to live the same way as the people who don't require much assist.
    There is definitely an unspoken goal of working less and earn more. This oxymoron could be the cause.

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