Grace Bell, Virginia Van Pelt, Jessica Lac

1st Period
Synthesized Argument
2/20/19

“To what extent does the American Dream exist today?”

James Truslow Adams first used the term “American Dream” in a 1931 book, in which
he stated it was a “dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for
everyone” (Adams). While this term represents the core values of American culture, its meaning
has changed throughout the decades and has come to mean different things to different people.
Its current definition is regarded as more materialistic than the original, which focused on
equality for all, although its basic meaning is the same- a “better and richer and fuller” life for
all. However, the way most people interpret a “better life” has shifted to financial aspirations
rather than equal opportunity (Shiller).
The U.S. Constitution became the backbone of American principles as it emphasized the
rights of the people and prevented the tyrannical rule of a king. “Of all the gifts bestowed on this
country at its founding the one alone remains as the element of American exceptionalism is the
constitutional system” (Lewis). This document made limited say of the people in their
government and lives become an idea of the past. It gave U.S. citizens the rights they deserved
such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. These were dubbed as natural rights that
could not be taken away from anyone. The U.S. offered people the ability to express their
individuality in whatever capacity they desired. In America people were empowered to “exercise
[their] own capacities to the fullest,” which enabled them to make worthwhile contributions and
further society (Bowles). This premature version of the American Dream consumed everyone
and resulted in a prosperous country that people aspired to live in.
More than 150 years later, 1950s Americans were filled with national pride. In the wake
of the Cold War and the impending threat of communism, citizens found comfort in their belief
of the superiority of democracy. While some believed that America was great because of its
material wealth, others advocated that America’s principles of freedom and equal opportunity for
all citizens to work towards success in a fair system put America ahead of the Soviet Union
(“The Essence of America”). The American Dream of democracy and equal opportunity
prevailed in the face of the Cold War. As the American Dream developed during this decade,
citizens highlighted the idea of natural rights, which ensured that every person is valuable in “his
own right and for himself” (Bowles).
As time progressed, the idea of the American Dream evolved. Communism no longer
posed a threat, which enabled people to turn their focus to other important matters. Although
Americans all have different ideas of what’s important or what could improve their lives, for
most, one thing comes to mind: money. Nowadays monetary incentives fuel peoples’ ideas of the
pathway to happiness. The leaders of our nation substantiate this common interpretation of the
American Dream. “Mr. Trump and Ben Carson, the secretary of housing and urban development,
have suggested it involves owning a beautiful home and roaring business” (Shiller). However,
the LGBTQ community brings to light that freedom to be you should still be the American
Dream, and for many people it is. Other people view safety as their dream, while others conjure
health to mind when asked (Brown). Despite this, the majority of peoples’ mindsets have shifted
to match the business facet of America, overlooking the idea of natural rights which inspired the
American Dream to begin with.
The materialistic viewpoint of the American Dream pressures the “average Joe” to
become rich, no matter what their definition of “rich” is. The concept itself is elusive, changing
from person to person. In the 1930s, after the publication of Adams’s book, The Epic of
America, researchers were surprised to learn that almost all children had earned more than their
parents (Leonhardt). Americans of the 1950s had a better chance of making a larger income.
Achieving a better, richer, and fuller life was a virtual guarantee for this generation because of
the rapid economic growth. Today, it is questionable whether this dream is attainable. A variety
of surveys answered by the common American revealed different answers on what they
considered as “rich”. Some believed it would take $1,000,000, yet the median response leveled
up to $122,000 (Dunleavey). America is filled with hard workers who work 9 to 5 jobs, yet most
never seem to possess a Mercedes Benz, a private lake house, or the most recent iPhone. The
average household income in America amounts to $56,516, around half of the income most
people consider “rich” (Martin). These people work long hours, but aren’t lucky enough to live
out their dream to its fullest extent.
When James Adams first used the term “American Dream”, it “emphasized ideals rather
than material goods” (Shiller), and was “a dream of a social order in which each man and each
woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable” (Adams).
He argued that everyone should be allowed to be the best version of themselves in a society
where they can work towards their goals while being themselves. Use of the term became more
frequent in the 1960s with Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech which mentioned an
American Dream in which equality and freedom were available to all. By the 1980s, home
advertisements used the expression most often, which contributed to the current understanding of
the American Dream (Shiller). Although it is easy to get caught up in the materialistic aspects of
today’s American Dream, we should instead focus as a society on what the American Dream first
meant.
 Works Cited

Bowles, Chester. “The Most Powerful Idea in the World.” The New York Times, The New York
Times, 13 May 1951,
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/teachers/archival/19510515AmericanDream.pdf.

Brown, Ian. “American Dreams.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 2 July 2016,
www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/07/01/opinion/sunday/american-dreams.html.

Dunleavey, Mp. “You Really Can't Be Too Rich.” The New York Times, The New York Times,
21 May 2005, www.nytimes.com/2005/05/21/business/you-really-cant-be-too-rich.html.

Leonhardt, David. “The American Dream, Quantified at Last.” The New York Times, The New
York Times, 8 Dec. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/12/08/opinion/the-american-dream-
quantified-at-last.html.

Lewis, Anthony. “The American Dream.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 13 Oct.
1975, www.nytimes.com/1975/10/13/archives/the-american-dream.html.

Martin, Emmie. “Here's How Much the Average American Earns at Every Age.” CNBC, CNBC,
24 Aug. 2017, www.cnbc.com/2017/08/24/how-much-americans-earn-at-every-age.html.

Shiller, Robert J. “The Transformation of the 'American Dream'.” The New York Times, The
New York Times, 4 Aug. 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/08/04/upshot/the-transformation-of-the-
american-dream.html.

Unknown. “The Essence of America.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 9 Aug. 1959,
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/teachers/archival/19590809AmericanDream.pdf.