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American Dreams

  • Bernie Sanders’ proposals for free education and healthcare were flatly rejected by those who said "we are not Denmark". A new book argues that the…
  • American Promise airs tonight, Tuesday, February 3 at 10:00 p.m. on PBS. Filmmakers Michèle Stephenson and Joe Brewster documented the education of their…
  • The statistics are grim. Since the late 1970s, incomes for the top 1% of Americans have quadrupled, while real wages for the bottom half of the workforce…
  • By looking at corporate and financial structures from an historical perspective, Smith contends that over four decades our middle class has been…
  • Growing up in the South Bronx, Juan Carlos Reyes' dream was to be a doorman in Manhattan. A college degree has helped him achieve much more, but Reyes is convinced his success is an aberration — and that few of his peers will ever achieve the American dream.
  • In the conservative view, reinvigorating the American dream means lowering the floor below which government won't let people fall. It also means raising the ceiling on successful people.
  • From the moment he burst on the national scene, Barack Obama has served as a living example of the American dream — proof that in this country, anyone can succeed. But what sets him and other Democrats apart from Republicans is the idea of the American dream as a collective enterprise.
  • We celebrate the deeply embedded ideal of the American dream every day, and yet the phrase has always been fraught. For many, there is no dream, so here, we give you "A Brief Diary of the American Nightmare."
  • In a nation as diverse as the United States, the idea of "the American dream" means different things to different people. Many associate the dream with intangible ideals like freedom of expression, freedom of religion, optimism and family ties. But the American dream has also long been associated with attaining a higher standard of living, particularly one that surpasses that of the previous generation.
  • Many Americans have long believed that the United States is a land of opportunity, where anyone who works hard can climb the economic ladder. But evidence from recent decades indicates that, for many Americans, that dream of economic mobility falls short.

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