4 ms·

>We are at an unprecedented point in American history, and I'm concerned we may lose sight of the American Dream The understatement of the year. From all I rea

>We are at an unprecedented point in American history, and I'm concerned we may lose sight of the American Dream The understatement of the year. From all I read, hasn't it been dead and burried for decades? (Of course not for some founder who hit the jackpot like Jeff). "Evidence indicates that in recent decades social mobility in the United States has declined, and income inequality has risen.[7][8] Social mobility is lower in the US than in many European countries, especially the Nordic countries.[9][10] Despite this, many Americans are likely to believe they have a better chance of social mobility than Europeans do.[11] The US ranked 27th in the 2020 Global Social Mobility Index.[12]" The only related thing remained appears to be individual scheming and grinding to make it big, by whatever means necessary, and hope you get lucky. Not some notion that the current environment is conductive to that, or that "hard work" alone will get it, and for most young people forget about the "house with the white picket fence" too. And the charity work mentioned, good as it might be, is more like a drop in the bucket, that won't change much either way.

s1artibartfast 2y ago
what are you quoting? I dont see that in the article.
Hilift 2y ago
There has always been poor people in the US. There seems to be more shame and stigma attached now though, along with denial. I think that is one of the reasons the iPhone is more popular in the US. It helps people feel like they aren't poor.
- defrost 2y ago
  > There has always been poor people in {X} has been a classic dismissal throughout history - it was the excuse in Dickensian England also. What has more leverage and potential for positive change is an analytic approach looking at multiple countries, quintile various income|asset bands, look at food and housing security in these bands, look at the movement from band to band and quantify what it is to be poor and how many are poor - look to the factors that cause or are tightly bound to being poor.
- gadders 2y ago
  There have always been poor people, but also wage earners managed to support a nuclear family and have a mortgage on a house with a non-working partner through working a blue collar job. This seems to be disappearing.
- coldtea 2y ago
  >There has always been poor people in the US. ...and those poor people in the US could always look up to much better social mobility trends than the current ones.
  - watwut 2y ago
    "Always" is massive overstatement. If you was a woman, your only way up was if you found rich guy to marry you. It is not that women did not actually worked, but they had only lower paid jobs with no possibility of promotion available. If you was black, your abilities to go up were obviously severely limited. Even for whites, south had very stable social hierarchy - you had a place where you was meant to stay at. It was resembling aristocratic setup rather then actual free for all capitalism. Civil war changed that by a lot and opened mobility options that were not there before.
- throwpoaster 2y ago
  There have always been poor people, but those poor people keep getting richer when compared with each other across time. Better to be working poor now than a king in the middle ages (in terms of access to information, health outcomes, food quality, healthspan, lifespan, etc., etc., etc.).
gary_0 2y ago
> hasn't it been dead and burried for decades? "It's called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it." - George Carlin, like 30 years ago. Just after he observed that "hard-working people of modest means continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don't give a fuck about them."
- throwpoaster 2y ago
  America is the best country in the world for growing something new. Source: I am a non-American who does business in America.
  - BriggyDwiggs42 2y ago
    Even if I assume you’re right, upward mobility and ease of starting a business are quite different things.
    - throwpoaster 2y ago
      Yes, they are different: the latter is a prerequisite of the former.
      - coldtea 2y ago
        They're orthogonal. You can start and business and get downwards social mobility (lose your personal investment in a bussiness which fails). And inversely, you can get upwards mobility without starting a business (like with a promotion or getting a better job). Or rather, in the last decades, increasingly you can't. But traditionally, that was the way most people saw it. The "company man" going through the ranks, the immigrant who studies and gets a good job, etc. Building a business was always a thing for a minority. And since most new businesses fail anyway (and in most fields require capital, not to mention connections and lack, plus a specific set of skills like salesmanship and market savvy), "start a business" as a solution to social mobility at large, is a really bad idea. Starting a succesful business doesn't even necessarily translate to social mobility for others. In fact, it can happen even in a social mobility wise regressing economy. E.g. many people lose better paying jobs, and end up working on the cheap for some uber (pun intended) successful new business.
throwpoaster 2y ago
"Gotcha: Can't win, don't try." - Bart Simpson This is nihilist cynicism, and is worth rejecting out-of-hand.
- stonogo 2y ago
  Why?
  - throwpoaster 2y ago
    Charities that receive 8m can help people more than charities that receive zero.
- coldtea 2y ago
  Take the same idea and apply it to gambling. Does it hold up well? In any case it's a moot point, to an argument nobody made. Trying or not trying, and understanding that the (documented) cases of social mobility are worsening are orthogonal. In fact, with that understanding, a society can do something to improve that, which will also make it easier for people trying.
  - throwpoaster 2y ago
    The point was that donating 8m to charity wouldn’t help because too many things are wrong. This is obviously incorrect, prima facie.
imacomputertoo 2y ago
people have been saying the American dream is dead my entire life. I'm tired of hearing it. I'm also tired of people saying the American dream is about becoming a billionaire. It's not. It never has been. It's always been about having the opportunity to improve your wealth and living standards. Sometimes that means just leaving something better for your children, much like the Italian and Irish immigrants did That American dream is very much still alive. On a related note, I'm tired of hearing people say they can't afford to buy a home. Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. These people would do better to put some money into a low cost index fund, or max out their 401k if they have one. Obviously, the very poor do not have money to invest with, but they can give their children a better life. it's certainly not easy, but it's possible. The working class, however (not the most poor), routinely chooses to put their money into flat screen tvs, Iphones, expensive vehicles and clothing, and other depreciable assets. We've failed to teach people how to take advantage of the abundant opportunities in America, and we have a culture of frivolous spending.
- coldtea 2y ago
  >people have been saying the American dream is dead my entire life. I'm tired of hearing it. Doesn't make it less true. >I'm also tired of people saying the American dream is about becoming a billionaire. It's not. It never has been. It's always been about having the opportunity to improve your wealth and living standards. True, but that's what is argued that has regressed (and the numbers back this up). >On a related note, I'm tired of hearing people say they can't afford to buy a home. Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. Which is irrelevant. People want to buy a home to have a shelter and not be subject to raising rent, evictions, and insecurity. Not necessarily to "build wealth". And, in past decades, they used to be able to buy a house, without huge mortgage costs, and pay it off quite early too.
- pjc50 2y ago
  > Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. Buying a second house may be questionable, but the first house has so many tax and leverage advantages as well as "hedging" against the volatile rental market. Especially when Americans can get 30 year fixed mortgages! > but they can give their children a better life. it's certainly not easy, but it's possible. The working class, however (not the most poor), routinely chooses to put their money into flat screen tvs What if they want to give themselves a better life, rather than just their children? > flat screen tvs All TVs are flatscreen now. This is a "tell" that somebody is mentally copy-pasting a rant from the early 2000s.
oooyay 2y ago
I mean, also > Our family made eight $1 million donations to nonprofit groups working to support those most currently in need Color me cynical but he's quite literally part of the problem, writing about the problem in abstracts.

s1artibartfast 2y ago

what are you quoting? I dont see that in the article.

Hilift 2y ago

There has always been poor people in the US. There seems to be more shame and stigma attached now though, along with denial. I think that is one of the reasons the iPhone is more popular in the US. It helps people feel like they aren't poor.

defrost 2y ago
> There has always been poor people in {X} has been a classic dismissal throughout history - it was the excuse in Dickensian England also. What has more leverage and potential for positive change is an analytic approach looking at multiple countries, quintile various income|asset bands, look at food and housing security in these bands, look at the movement from band to band and quantify what it is to be poor and how many are poor - look to the factors that cause or are tightly bound to being poor.
gadders 2y ago
There have always been poor people, but also wage earners managed to support a nuclear family and have a mortgage on a house with a non-working partner through working a blue collar job. This seems to be disappearing.
coldtea 2y ago
>There has always been poor people in the US. ...and those poor people in the US could always look up to much better social mobility trends than the current ones.
- watwut 2y ago
  "Always" is massive overstatement. If you was a woman, your only way up was if you found rich guy to marry you. It is not that women did not actually worked, but they had only lower paid jobs with no possibility of promotion available. If you was black, your abilities to go up were obviously severely limited. Even for whites, south had very stable social hierarchy - you had a place where you was meant to stay at. It was resembling aristocratic setup rather then actual free for all capitalism. Civil war changed that by a lot and opened mobility options that were not there before.
throwpoaster 2y ago
There have always been poor people, but those poor people keep getting richer when compared with each other across time. Better to be working poor now than a king in the middle ages (in terms of access to information, health outcomes, food quality, healthspan, lifespan, etc., etc., etc.).

gary_0 2y ago

> hasn't it been dead and burried for decades? "It's called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it." - George Carlin, like 30 years ago. Just after he observed that "hard-working people of modest means continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don't give a fuck about them."

throwpoaster 2y ago
America is the best country in the world for growing something new. Source: I am a non-American who does business in America.
- BriggyDwiggs42 2y ago
  Even if I assume you’re right, upward mobility and ease of starting a business are quite different things.
  - throwpoaster 2y ago
    Yes, they are different: the latter is a prerequisite of the former.
    - coldtea 2y ago
      They're orthogonal. You can start and business and get downwards social mobility (lose your personal investment in a bussiness which fails). And inversely, you can get upwards mobility without starting a business (like with a promotion or getting a better job). Or rather, in the last decades, increasingly you can't. But traditionally, that was the way most people saw it. The "company man" going through the ranks, the immigrant who studies and gets a good job, etc. Building a business was always a thing for a minority. And since most new businesses fail anyway (and in most fields require capital, not to mention connections and lack, plus a specific set of skills like salesmanship and market savvy), "start a business" as a solution to social mobility at large, is a really bad idea. Starting a succesful business doesn't even necessarily translate to social mobility for others. In fact, it can happen even in a social mobility wise regressing economy. E.g. many people lose better paying jobs, and end up working on the cheap for some uber (pun intended) successful new business.

throwpoaster 2y ago

"Gotcha: Can't win, don't try." - Bart Simpson This is nihilist cynicism, and is worth rejecting out-of-hand.

stonogo 2y ago
Why?
- throwpoaster 2y ago
  Charities that receive 8m can help people more than charities that receive zero.
coldtea 2y ago
Take the same idea and apply it to gambling. Does it hold up well? In any case it's a moot point, to an argument nobody made. Trying or not trying, and understanding that the (documented) cases of social mobility are worsening are orthogonal. In fact, with that understanding, a society can do something to improve that, which will also make it easier for people trying.
- throwpoaster 2y ago
  The point was that donating 8m to charity wouldn’t help because too many things are wrong. This is obviously incorrect, prima facie.

imacomputertoo 2y ago

people have been saying the American dream is dead my entire life. I'm tired of hearing it. I'm also tired of people saying the American dream is about becoming a billionaire. It's not. It never has been. It's always been about having the opportunity to improve your wealth and living standards. Sometimes that means just leaving something better for your children, much like the Italian and Irish immigrants did That American dream is very much still alive. On a related note, I'm tired of hearing people say they can't afford to buy a home. Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. These people would do better to put some money into a low cost index fund, or max out their 401k if they have one. Obviously, the very poor do not have money to invest with, but they can give their children a better life. it's certainly not easy, but it's possible. The working class, however (not the most poor), routinely chooses to put their money into flat screen tvs, Iphones, expensive vehicles and clothing, and other depreciable assets. We've failed to teach people how to take advantage of the abundant opportunities in America, and we have a culture of frivolous spending.

coldtea 2y ago
>people have been saying the American dream is dead my entire life. I'm tired of hearing it. Doesn't make it less true. >I'm also tired of people saying the American dream is about becoming a billionaire. It's not. It never has been. It's always been about having the opportunity to improve your wealth and living standards. True, but that's what is argued that has regressed (and the numbers back this up). >On a related note, I'm tired of hearing people say they can't afford to buy a home. Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. Which is irrelevant. People want to buy a home to have a shelter and not be subject to raising rent, evictions, and insecurity. Not necessarily to "build wealth". And, in past decades, they used to be able to buy a house, without huge mortgage costs, and pay it off quite early too.
pjc50 2y ago
> Buying a house is a very expensive and slow way to build wealth. Buying a second house may be questionable, but the first house has so many tax and leverage advantages as well as "hedging" against the volatile rental market. Especially when Americans can get 30 year fixed mortgages! > but they can give their children a better life. it's certainly not easy, but it's possible. The working class, however (not the most poor), routinely chooses to put their money into flat screen tvs What if they want to give themselves a better life, rather than just their children? > flat screen tvs All TVs are flatscreen now. This is a "tell" that somebody is mentally copy-pasting a rant from the early 2000s.

oooyay 2y ago

I mean, also > Our family made eight $1 million donations to nonprofit groups working to support those most currently in need Color me cynical but he's quite literally part of the problem, writing about the problem in abstracts.