I thought that this article was interesting enough to attempt to spur a discussion with it. I don't agree with everything in the article but I like the general tone of questioning what your dream really is. For example, I've always been willing to make a little less if other criteria are fulfilled.

http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article ... debt/88236

A recent "USA Today" poll showed that, given the worsening economy, high prices for energy, and the housing crisis, Americans are more pessimistic about their lives than at any time in the past half-century. Most worrisome is that just 45 percent believe their children will be better off financially than they are, which caused reporter David Lynch to ask if the American Dream was, if not dead, then at least wounded.

I've been asking the same question since I started writing the original Generation Debt series for "The Village Voice" back in 2004. Back then the economy was booming, but the long-term data were already clear -- young men were earning significantly less than their fathers had 30 years ago (given inflation); young women were barely making progress on the gains in the workforce that their mothers had worked so hard for; and both were saddled with record prices for housing, health care, and education, as well as rising student loan and credit card debt.

Well, now I think it's time to take a fresh look at the issue. Maybe the American Dream is dead or wounded -- or maybe it's just outdated.

Perhaps the strongest symbol of the traditional American Dream is the single-family home in an automobile-dependent suburb. Today, in many places, those houses are unaffordable for the middle class.

With gas prices soaring to an average above four dollars a gallon, the car commute is unaffordable, too -- and no one is expecting gas to come back down to the 99-cent range anytime soon.

Furthermore, even if house prices continue to decline and cars get more fuel-efficient, it turns out that the driving commute itself cuts into people's happiness -- so much so, one pair of researchers found, that someone commuting an hour each way would have to earn 40 percent more to compensate for the decreased quality of life.

Another piece of the American Dream that we're saying goodbye to is lifetime employment with a single corporation that offers health care, a pension, and a gold watch upon retirement. Manufacturing has moved overseas, and large corporations simply don't operate like that anymore.

For high-school educated workers, the middle class job is all but kaput. GM was the largest employer in the country in 1970, with an average wage of $17.50 an hour. Today GM is all but bankrupt, and Wal-Mart is the nation's largest employer, with an average wage of $9 an hour.

But what about the most fundamental assumption of the American Dream, the idea that standards of living, as measured by money and ownership of material things, ought to keep rising steadily year after year, generation after generation? That one is looking to be on the shakiest ground of all.

First of all, by most measures, our country has long since passed the point where adding more income and more stuff will make us happier. Once a nation has a per capita income above $12,000, for example, there is little correlation between wealth and happiness.

And in the U.S., researcher Daniel Gilbert found, once an individual passes $50,000 a year in income, more money has little effect on his or her happiness on average.

In fact, not surprisingly, the top earners have far less free time than the poorest fifth of Americans, and their average mood is not much better.

Secondly, indications are mounting that the planet just can't take all this constantly increasing driving and shopping and fast-food eating. If the entire world consumed the way Americans do (China and India are the most obvious examples of countries headed in this direction), we would need six Earths full of resources.

So for those of you who, like me, hope to be living another 60, 70, or 80 years in this unique nation, it might be time to ask: What is our new American Dream? If it's not a house, a car, a lawn, a lifetime of job security, and a constantly rising standard of living, what are we looking for? What should we be looking for?

I don't have the definitive answer. But I have three suggestions and observations.
Time, Not Stuff

Young people prize flexibility with their time. More likely to be raised by working mothers than any generation in history, we've seen the tradeoffs and don't want to fall into the "two-income trap" where both partners work more and more hours, barely seeing each other or their kids, just to keep up with the Joneses.

Both young men and young women say over and over in employment surveys that they want time to take care of their families and their health, to be involved in their communities, and to "have a life."

As we weather this economic downturn, I predict that even more young people are going to choose -- or be pushed into -- a smaller-scale, downshifted lifestyle where they make do with less stuff and trade more money for more time.

People are already planting more gardens, driving less and riding their bikes or public transportation more, canceling their cable subscriptions, and spending more time at home. This is a perfect example of making a virtue out of necessity -- all these changes save money, but they also mean a slower, healthier lifestyle that for some is its own reward.

There are even reports in the media of young families going to the extreme with the trend of taking out a "Selling All Worldly Possessions" ad on Craigslist and taking to the road.
Meaningful Employment

Money and security are important, but research says young people really want meaning in their jobs, too.

This includes finding a personal passion and getting a chance to do something important for the world.

One employment trend that attracts young people is self-employment and entrepreneurship. This ties in to our interest in individuality and flexibility. Nearly a fifth of the workforce can be classified as non-standard in some way, and non-standard workers are twice as likely to be under 25.

Going out on your own has its tradeoffs. This part of the workforce faces greater risk, and under our current laws, they have inadequate access to benefits such as health care and nondiscrimination protection. Yet it turns out many independent workers are more satisfied with their jobs than salaried employees at an equivalent level. That's in large part because autonomy is a major key to job satisfaction.

A second popular direction for young people seeking meaning in their employment is in public service. Teach for America, where college graduates go into underserved public schools for two years, is a top entry-level employer at many elite colleges.

And last year's College Cost Reduction and Access Act established a slew of new student loan forgiveness programs for young people who go into professions including social work, nursing, law enforcement, and firefighting, which should entice even more young people into these lines of work.

And they may well find satisfaction there. In one huge employer survey, the three job categories where employees were most likely to say they had their "Dream jobs" were, in order, teacher, police officer, and firefighter.
A New New Deal

This part is more political than personal. The old American Dream included a social safety net that provided a baseline of security. As noted, this is no longer being provided adequately by employers or the government.

Young people are the largest and fastest-growing group of Americans without health insurance, we lack access to pension plans, and the future of programs like Social Security and Medicare is threatened by current budget positions. Young Americans in polls hold a more favorable view of government solutions than older Americans, and we are calling for new government investments in portable, flexible benefits that will restore the social safety net while controlling rising costs.

These are scary times. But after Hurricane Katrina hit my hometown of New Orleans, I learned from the courage of people struggling to rebuild. I saw that pessimism is a luxury for easy times, while optimism is a necessity for times like these. The new American Dream may be smaller and less flashy than your father's Oldsmobile, but it's more sustainable -- and maybe it can take us farther.

I agree with most of this article. As someone in his 20's, I place a high value on time. My job is very flexible with time and I really appreciate it.
I remember reading an article a few years back about some company, I think it was Best Buy, experimenting with eliminating any set time in the work week. It excluded hourly, customer-service employees and who obviously need to be present for customers.
The idea was, as long as you get your work done, come and go as you need to. If you want to leave early to watch your kid's soccer game, you do it. If you need to come back after dinner to finish work, you do it.
I don't see why this wouldn't work and we might see more of this in the future.

That's how i operate at my job, and we were recently voted as one of the top 50 places to work in Canada. I generally still keep 9-5 hours but if i need to bend my schedule to take a day off, leave early, work from home or whatever it's no big deal. My only responsiblity is to bill 40 hours of work a week. How i do it is ultimately up to me.

I think the American Dream is outdated. The world has changed and so has the dream. The old dream is no longer achievable for more than a handful of people.

The old dream was building on attaining and increasing economic prosperity at a consistantly rising cost. The new dream is more about building a sustainable life, one without a consistantly rising cost associated with it.

Furthermore, as the population booms, the availability of resources declines. It's just simply not possible for everybody to have an acre of land, their own house, a car, etc. It's expected that the cost to obtain that would increase.

I'm not sure I agree that people are worse off than their parents, though. Even though devaluation has occurred, there's no arguing that certain consumer products (read: electronics) have gotten orders of magnitude more affordable. That in itself is an increase in quality of life that far more people have than had even twenty years ago. Even if you make less, it might be easier for you to afford something like a microwave than your parents did, which gives you more time to enjoy yourself. I think that is something that is largely overlooked when we compare our lives with our parents'.

I think another interesting point is that until the baby boomers came around, kids had it much more difficult and had much better work ethic. I don't know what effect that generation dying off will have, but I can't help but think part of the reason lots of young people don't have as much as their parents is simply because they don't want to plan or work for it.

I can't speak for everyone, but I have worked my ass off to have a good life. I worked for a company for 10 years, was let go in a very bullshit way in order for them to avoid severence. (It was a company wide move that I can't talk about until it's settled.) Now I am working for a much better company, but they are downsizing due to operating cost. I am waiting my turn. I am in Managment and come to work every day and work very hard. Thay won't be taken into account if I win the lay off lotto. On top of all that Gas prices are KILLING US. We are married (25 and 31 yrs old) and have never every been behind on a single bill until this year.
We are seriously trying to figure out how to get out of our house and downsize our lifestyle in compensate for the price of gas, and all the other things that is driviing up. Some American dream.

I feel like this guy climbed inside my head to write this article. Crazy stuff.

That guy can climb inside my head anytime.

Everything seemingly is spinning out of control

WASHINGTON - Is everything spinning out of control?

Midwestern levees are bursting. Polar bears are adrift. Gas prices are skyrocketing. Home values are abysmal. Air fares, college tuition and health care border on unaffordable. Wars without end rage in Iraq, Afghanistan and against terrorism.

Horatio Alger, twist in your grave.

The can-do, bootstrap approach embedded in the American psyche is under assault. Eroding it is a dour powerlessness that is chipping away at the country's sturdy conviction that destiny can be commanded with sheer courage and perseverance.

The sense of helplessness is even reflected in this year's presidential election. Each contender offers a sense of order — and hope. Republican John McCain promises an experienced hand in a frightening time. Democrat Barack Obama promises bright and shiny change, and his large crowds believe his exhortation, "Yes, we can."

Even so, a battered public seems discouraged by the onslaught of dispiriting things. An Associated Press-Ipsos poll says a barrel-scraping 17 percent of people surveyed believe the country is moving in the right direction. That is the lowest reading since the survey began in 2003.

An ABC News-Washington Post survey put that figure at 14 percent, tying the low in more than three decades of taking soundings on the national mood.

"It is pretty scary," said Charles Truxal, 64, a retired corporate manager in Rochester, Minn. "People are thinking things are going to get better, and they haven't been. And then you go hide in your basement because tornadoes are coming through. If you think about things, you have very little power to make it change."

Recent natural disasters around the world dwarf anything afflicting the U.S. Consider that more than 69,000 people died in the China earthquake, and that 78,000 were killed and 56,000 missing from the Myanmar cyclone.

Americans need do no more than check the weather, look in their wallets or turn on the news for their daily reality check on a world gone haywire.

Floods engulf Midwestern river towns. Is it global warming, the gradual degradation of a planet's weather that man seems powerless to stop or just a freakish late-spring deluge?

It hardly matters to those in the path. Just ask the people of New Orleans who survived Hurricane Katrina. They are living in a city where, 1,000 days after the storm, entire neighborhoods remain abandoned, a national embarrassment that evokes disbelief from visitors.

Food is becoming scarcer and more expensive on a worldwide scale, due to increased consumption in growing countries such as China and India and rising fuel costs. That can-do solution to energy needs — turning corn into fuel — is sapping fields of plenty once devoted to crops that people need to eat. Shortages have sparked riots. In the U.S., rice prices tripled and some stores rationed the staple.

Residents of the nation's capital and its suburbs repeatedly lose power for extended periods as mere thunderstorms rumble through. In California, leaders warn people to use less water in the unrelenting drought.

Want to get away from it all? The weak U.S. dollar makes travel abroad forbiddingly expensive. To add insult to injury, some airlines now charge to check luggage.

Want to escape on the couch? A writers' strike halted favorite TV shows for half a season. The newspaper on the table may soon be a relic of the Internet age. Just as video stores are falling by the wayside as people get their movies online or in the mail.

But there's always sports, right?

The moorings seem to be coming loose here, too.

Baseball stars Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens stand accused of enhancing their heroics with drugs. Basketball referees are suspected of cheating.

Stay tuned for less than pristine tales from the drug-addled Tour de France and who knows what from the Summer Olympics.

It's not the first time Americans have felt a loss of control.

Alger, the dime-novel author whose heroes overcame adversity to gain riches and fame, played to similar anxieties when the U.S. was becoming an industrial society in the late 1800s.

American University historian Allan J. Lichtman notes that the U.S. has endured comparable periods and worse, including the economic stagflation (stagnant growth combined with inflation) and Iran hostage crisis of 1980; the dawn of the Cold War, the Korean War and the hysterical hunts for domestic Communists in the late 1940s and early 1950s; and the Depression of the 1930s.

"All those periods were followed by much more optimistic periods in which the American people had their confidence restored," he said. "Of course, that doesn't mean it will happen again."

Each period also was followed by a change in the party controlling the White House.

This period has seen intense interest in the presidential primaries, especially the Democrats' five-month duel between Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Records were shattered by voters showing up at polling places, yearning for a voice in who will next guide the country as it confronts the uncontrollable.

Never mind that their views of their current leaders are near rock bottom, reflecting a frustration with Washington's inability to solve anything. President Bush barely gets the approval of three in 10 people, and it's even worse for the Democratic-led Congress.

Why the vulnerability? After all, this is the 21st century, not a more primitive past when little in life was assured. Surely people know how to fix problems now.

Maybe. And maybe this is what the 21st century will be about — a great unraveling of some things long taken for granted.

Oh no, the sky is falling!

Let's keep things in perspective... Every era had its problems, it just seems like everything's going to hell because that sort of story sells and also the fact that because of more access to information, we hear about everything.

I think that people tend to react to things poorly and since we have access to all this information, things tend to spin out of control more often.

Do you know why we don't have a British Dream?

Because we're awake.

This sounds far too appealing......

This is ridiculous

Holy shit, LW and g_v agreed on something.

Actually, I'm a bit surprised that there hasn't been debate on the article I posted. Maybe the broader concepts there aren't commonly seen as too outlandish.

I think they're not as surprising, and the more interesting aspects are philosophical rather than economic.