Saturday, February 23, 2013

The American Dream is Dead

This isn't something easy for me to say. However, it is obvious to any thinking person that "The American Dream is Dead". What does that mean? It means that there is no longer an equal chance of all people in the U.S. to succeed if they work really hard at it.

For example, in the 1950s a 17 year old male could get a job as a carpenter or garbage man and be able to immediately support 5 people. Though this wasn't true for women it was true for any male big and strong enough to get a job and to do it ongoing. Because this is not true anymore I think it useful to say "The American Dream is dead". Now success is based upon "Who you know" completely. Now, no matter what degree you get you are not assured of anything anymore. Though having the degree your unemployment rate might drift down to only 4% statistically, you still have to find work to pay off your student loans.

So, what happened? I would say the single biggest things that changed everything would be: "The price of energy rose exponentially starting in the 1970s with the Arab Oil Embargo. This would be the single biggest factor. This then caused the cost of raising and shipping food to rise exponentially because oil is used to grow food and to transport food. This also increased the price of vehicles exponentially as well. Then on top of this population has grown about 3 times worldwide since the 1950s. This has caused many growing areas for food to become built over worldwide and has also reduced growing capacity worldwide. This also creates more starving people who cannot affrord food worldwide. In order to survive some resort to crime. This crime increases the necessity of police and armies worldwide to suppress starving people.

So, it isn't just the American Dream that has died. To a greater or lesser degree everyone's dream has died worldwide.

So, what comes next? That is up to each and everyone of us. We will create the future. Any ideas?

Later: as I reread this I thought to myself about an old saying, "When the going gets tough the tough get going." So, though many will not survive in the U.S. and worldwide, those tough enough and resourceful enough worldwide WILL survive and prosper. So, in this sense though many will starve and die some will live their dreams not only in the U.S. but also worldwide!

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