!!! The American Dream Has Been Shredded!!!

Whether the American Dream is shattered is a matter of ongoing debate???

Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan singing The American Dream has come apart at the Seam. ... I say it's been shredded!

Just Roll The Dice!...With many Americans believing it is still achievable, while others see it as out of reach due to factors like economic challenges, rising costs, and a decline in job security. While a majority of Americans believe they are on track to achieve the dream, or have already achieved it, a growing percentage feels it is becoming more difficult to attain.

Arguments that the American Dream is not shattered!

A majority of Americans believe the dream is still achievable or are on their way to achieving it.

Many still find the American dream desirable, even if they believe it will be difficult to achieve.

Some data suggests that belief in the American Dream remains strong despite National pessimism.

Arguments that the American Dream is SHATTERED!

Economic challenges are a significant barrier, with high costs for essentials like housing and education making it difficult for many to get ahead.

Job security has decreased for many, with layoffs and a shift from long-term employment to gig contracts leaving workers feeling vulnerable.

Younger generations face unique challenges, including crushing student debt and a longer timeline to achieve milestones like homeownership compared to previous generations.

The Factors

Disincentivation - incentives for younger workers have been stolen away!

REAL TRUE PROBLEMS!

Soaring housing prices and stagnant wages have made it harder for many to achieve traditional markers of success like homeownership.

Student Loans

Jack Frost opines - "The federal government, state governments, religious educational facilities, state educational facilities, banks, employment agencies... ALL have colluded to keep "kids of all ages" in college! Give them big buckets of money and keep them out of the employment pool so as to keep the unemployment rate low. The government then looks good and can claim the economy is better than it truly is!"

The Federal Government and Internal Revenue Service could solve the student loan problem in the next 5 years by using a program known as Offer in Compromise. That program is a debt forgiveness program based on age, health, financial abilities and prospective future income. Given the chance, within a month, I could have a program rolling that allows millions of "drowning in debt" and bankrupt former students to compromise their student loan debt and become free at last!

Just Read On!

Gen-Z is not broken— However the American Dream is!!!

The American dream is fading away and it’s not because of lazy children!

Why on Earth are we asking Gen Z to perform the same as previous generations when they will not be met with the same cornucopia as their forefathers?

Thinking younger generations are lost is a time-honored American tradition, but in the case of Gen Z, their disillusion is connected to a change in economic opportunities.

In the last 30 years the ratio of median sales price of homes to median income has risen from 3.5 to 5.8. Gen Z’s earnings will not go as far as those of prior generations. This can easily explain a fundamental change in the way Gen Z interacts in the workplace. Where some people see a spoiled generation, I see the opposite. Spoiled to me is what prior generations had access to, such as a much wider range of jobs that could buy you a house. And it isn’t just people competing in today’s housing market. Financial institutions are buying homes and driving up the price.

The average age of a homebuyer is now 56 and the median age of a first-time homebuyer is 38. Compare that to 1991, when the median age of a first-time home buyer was 28, and you see the gravity of this problem. This changes the workplace relationship when “paying your dues” for six years after college used to mean you can own a home. Now, staring down a 16-year timeline is clearly making young people feel hopeless and therefore a lot more sensitive to how they are being treated.

Is there hope?

But this is just one aspect. What about hope for the future?

Well I’d argue with the current system the problems are just getting started. There are not any structures in place that help people catch up. Tax breaks are mostly going to older generations, so the richest people increase their advantage.

Even if you want an animal of lower intellect to jump through a hoop you have to make the reward interesting for them. As I see it, it isn’t that Gen Zers have a lower willingness to be trained in “proper workplace etiquette.” It is that they are not being properly incentivized to invest in this process.

But it isn’t just financial security that is changing. Twenty-three percent of Gen Z and millennials surveyed said that because of climate change, having kids would be “irresponsible.” Beyond the purely monetary, when there are existential threats like this, seen as so prevalent by younger generations, it reduces their incentive to “buy in” the way other generations in the past have.

The need to rebuild the American dream

To this point we have only discussed broad populations. A Johns Hopkins study even back in 2014 found that the American Dream was largely a myth. “The study followed nearly 800 Baltimore schoolchildren for more than a quarter of a century beginning in 1982. After more than 30 years, the study found that the majority of students stayed in the same socio-economic class as their parents. Of the children from the lowest income groups, only 4 percent had a college degree by the age of 28. By the age of 28, 49% of the Black men from low-income backgrounds had been convicted of a crime and most of these were unemployed.”

People are feeling it all over this country. The opportunities once available in this country do not exist much to some, and only in a reduced fashion to others. Instead of lamenting the behavior of the younger generations, maybe we should take responsibility for the fact that the land of opportunity that once existed, especially for the older generations, does not exist today. While it may be too late for this generation, hopefully we can provide better circumstances for future generations.

If we rebuilt the American dream in earnest, I’d wager there would be a lot more young people being willing to answer that late night email... And Jack says-"work nights, weekends and holidays!"

A Great article from the Fast Company website by:

George Kailas, CEO at Prospero.Ai.

GOD HELP US ALL!

TERM LIMITS IS A SOLUTION!

Music Video & Lyrics posted below.

Enjoy!

Full Lyrics

Heartland

Written by: Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson

[Verse]

There's a home place under fire tonight in the heartland

And the bankers are taking my home and my land from me

There's a big aching hole in my chest now where my heart was

And a hole in the sky where God used to be

There's a home place under fire tonight in the heartland

There's a well where the water's so bitter nobody can drink

Ain't no way to get high and my mouth is so dry that I can't speak

Don't they know that I'm dying why's nobody crying for me

My American dream fell apart at the seams

You tell me what it means you tell me what it means

There's a home place under fire tonight in a heartland

And bankers are taking the homes and the land away

There's a young boy closing his eyes tonight in a heartland

Who will wake up a man with some land and a loan he can't pay

His American dream fell apart at the seams

You tell me what it means you tell me what it means

My American dream

There's a home place under fire tonight in the heartland [x4]