The Betrayal Of The American Dream

Download or read book The Betrayal of the American Dream written by Donald L. Barlett and published by Public Affairs. This book was released on 2012-07-31 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the formidable challenges facing the middle class, calling for fundamental changes while surveying the extent of the problem and identifying the people and agencies most responsible.

Download or read book Paying the Price written by Sara Goldrick-Rab and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2016-09-01 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “bracing and well-argued” study of America’s college debt crisis—“necessary reading for anyone concerned about the fate of American higher education” (Kirkus). College is far too expensive for many people today, and the confusing mix of federal, state, institutional, and private financial aid leaves countless students without the resources they need to pay for it. In Paying the Price, education scholar Sara Goldrick-Rab reveals the devastating effect of these shortfalls. Goldrick-Rab examines a study of 3,000 students who used the support of federal aid and Pell Grants to enroll in public colleges and universities in Wisconsin in 2008. Half the students in the study left college without a degree, while less than 20 percent finished within five years. The cause of their problems, time and again, was lack of money. Unable to afford tuition, books, and living expenses, they worked too many hours at outside jobs, dropped classes, took time off to save money, and even went without adequate food or housing. In many heartbreaking cases, they simply left school—not with a degree, but with crippling debt. Goldrick-Rab combines that data with devastating stories of six individual students, whose struggles make clear the human and financial costs of our convoluted financial aid policies. In the final section of the book, Goldrick-Rab offers a range of possible solutions, from technical improvements to the financial aid application process, to a bold, public sector–focused “first degree free” program. "Honestly one of the most exciting books I've read, because [Goldrick-Rab has] solutions. It's a manual that I'd recommend to anyone out there, if you're a parent, if you're a teacher, if you're a student."—Trevor Noah, The Daily Show

Download or read book Chasing the American Dream written by Mark Robert Rank PhD and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2014-03-01 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States has been epitomized as a land of opportunity, where hard work and skill can bring personal success and economic well-being. The American Dream has captured the imagination of people from all walks of life, and to many, it represents the heart and soul of the country. But there is another, darker side to the bargain that America strikes with its people -- it is the price we pay for our individual pursuit of the American Dream. That price can be found in the economic hardship present in the lives of millions of Americans. In Chasing the American Dream, leading social scientists Mark Robert Rank, Thomas A. Hirschl, and Kirk A. Foster provide a new and innovative look into a curious dynamic -- the tension between the promise of economic opportunities and rewards and the amount of turmoil that Americans encounter in their quest for those rewards. The authors explore questions such as: -What percentage of Americans achieve affluence, and how much income mobility do we actually have? -Are most Americans able to own a home, and at what age? -How is it that nearly 80 percent of us will experience significant economic insecurity at some point between ages 25 and 60? -How can access to the American Dream be increased? Combining personal interviews with dozens of Americans and a longitudinal study covering 40 years of income data, the authors tell the story of the American Dream and reveal a number of surprises. The risk of economic vulnerability has increased substantially over the past four decades, and the American Dream is becoming harder to reach and harder to keep. Yet for most Americans, the Dream lies not in wealth, but in economic security, pursuing one's passions, and looking toward the future. Chasing the American Dream provides us with a new understanding into the dynamics that shape our fortunes and a deeper insight into the importance of the American Dream for the future of the country.

Download or read book The American Dream written by Cal Jillson and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2016-11-18 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness: these words have long represented the promise of America, a “shimmering vision of a fruitful country open to all who come, learn, work, save, invest, and play by the rules.” In 2004, Cal Jillson took stock of this vision and showed how the nation’s politicians deployed the American Dream, both in campaigns and governance, to hold the American people to their program. “Full of startling ideas that make sense,” NPR's senior correspondent Juan Williams remarked, Jillson's book offered the fullest exploration yet of the origins and evolution of the ideal that serves as the foundation of our national ethos and collective self-image. Nonetheless, in the dozen years since Pursuing the American Dream was published, the American Dream has fared poorly. The decline of social mobility and the rise of income inequality—to say nothing of the extraordinary social, political, and economic developments of the Bush and Obama presidencies—have convinced many that the American Dream is no more. This is the concern that Jillson addresses in his new book, The American Dream: In History, Politics, and Fiction, which juxtaposes the claims of political, social, and economic elite against the view of American life consistently offered in our national literature. Our great novelists, from Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville to John Updike, Philip Roth, Toni Morrison, and beyond highlight the limits and challenges of life—the difficulty if not impossibility of the dream—especially for racial, ethnic, and religious minorities as well as women. His book takes us through the changing meaning and reality of the American Dream, from the seventeenth century to the present day, revealing a distinct, sustained separation between literary and political elite. The American Dream, Jillson suggests, took shape early in our national experience and defined the nation throughout its growth and development, yet it has always been challenged, even rejected, in our most celebrated literature. This is no different in our day, when what we believe about the American Dream reveals as much about its limits as its possibilities.

Download or read book China Horizon, The: Glory And Dream Of A Civilizational State written by Weiwei Zhang and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2016-05-10 with total page 195 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a book of China's own political narrative written by one of China's leading and best-known thinkers. It is the last part of the author's 'China Trilogy', which is a best-seller in China, with over one million copies sold. The book in itself is a centerpiece of the unfolding debate within China on the nature and future of the country and how it compares with the West. It addresses a hugely important issue of the day, i.e., in what way China is overtaking or may overtake the United States as the world's preeminent power. The author provides an original and thought-provoking study on how China has managed, through its own development model, to catch up and even surpass, to various extents, the United States, in terms of gross GDP, net household assets and social protection.The book elaborates on how China has engaged itself in reshaping its institutions to ensure its smooth rise, drawing on the strengths of its own traditions, socialist legacies and elements from the West. It analyzes the weakness of the Western political institutions and discusses how China has developed its own institutional edge over the West. The author argues that as a civilizational state, China has evolved a logic of its own for development and its own political discourse which questions seriously many Western assumptions about democracy, good governance and universal values.The book recaptures the essence of China's past glory and discusses the horizon of the Chinese dream as well as how China should meet the various challenges ahead. It offers a unique and original perspective on the future of this coming superpower. Like The China Wave, this book is both discerning and provocative, and serves as a required reading for everyone concerned with the rise of China and its global implications.

Download or read book American Political Culture [3 volumes] written by Michael Shally-Jensen and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2015-04-28 with total page 1378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This all-encompassing encyclopedia provides a broad perspective on U.S. politics, culture, and society, but also goes beyond the facts to consider the myths, ideals, and values that help shape and define the nation. Demonstrating that political culture is equally rooted in public events, internal debates, and historical experiences, this unique, three-volume encyclopedia examines an exceptionally broad range of factors shaping modern American politics, including popular belief, political action, and the institutions of power and authority. Readers will see how political culture is shaped by the attitudes, opinions, and behaviors of Americans, and how it affects those things in return. The set also addresses the issue of American "exceptionalism" and examines the nation's place in the world, both historically and in the 21st century. Essays cover pressing matters like congressional gridlock, energy policy, abortion politics, campaign finance, Supreme Court rulings, immigration, crime and punishment, and globalization. Social and cultural issues such as religion, war, inequality, and privacy rights are discussed as well. Perhaps most intriguingly, the encyclopedia surveys the fierce ongoing debate between different political camps over the nation's historical development, its present identity, and its future course. By exploring both fact and mythology, the work will enable students to form a broad yet nuanced understanding of the full range of forces and issues affecting—and affected by—the political process.

Download or read book The Great Gatsby and the American Dream written by Sandra Kochan and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2007-03-23 with total page 23 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, University of Constance (Uni), course: American Literature and Culture, language: English, abstract: Since the end of the Second World War the United States of America has been the most powerful country in the world. American power has included cultural power. Writing or talking about America means invoking the American Dream, which remains a major element of the national identity. The American Dream encompasses the myth of America: a myth defined by another familiar phrase – the New World. In its origins, America was conceived of as a new world, a new beginning, a second chance. The contrast of course was with Europe – the Old World – characterized by tyranny, corruption, and social divisions. The American Constitution guaranteed all Americans “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” This is the heart of the American Dream. People believed that the American dream was, from the beginning, part and parcel of American history, culture and language, including the early colonial period. “America was born out of a dream.” But the American Dream has come to mean at a popular level. It is to go to the West and become a millionaire. The American dream is conceived of in terms of success and of material success in particular: getting rich quick is what it is all about. But in its true sense it has never been limited to material success alone. So what do we actually understand under the term “American Dream” and what is the origin of this phrase? When did it first appear in the language? And how has the phrase itself evolved over time? Only during the time of political and cultural upheaval could the concept of the American Dream enter the national lexicon. The true origin of the phrase was first mentioned in 1931, by a middlebrow historian James Truslow Adams in his book The Epic of America. In this book, the phrase appears for the first time in the Preface, when Adams refers to the “American dream of a better, richer, and happier life,” adding that “that dream or hope has been present from the start.” In the Epilogue, which was probably written before the Preface, Adams goes into more detail and broadens the scope of the American Dream concept, explaining that the most distinctive gift that America has made to the world is “the American dream, that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man, with opportunity for each according to his ability or achievement.”