How’s the American Dream working out for you?
Some 48% of Americans say it’s not working out for them, and of those 56% say they fear it may never work out, according to a recent survey of 1,008 Americans by the polling firm StrategyOne, a Daniel J. Edelman company.
The good news is, of course, the other half.
Of those surveyed, 52% said they believe they are living the American Dream. Maybe they are not watching television shows and movies that constantly suggest everyone should be a millionaire.
Among people in households earning between $40,000 and $50,000, only 41% say they believe they are living the dream, the survey reported.
Here’s who says they’re not living the Amercan dream: 42% of college graduates and 29% of people in households earning $75,000 or more a year. Maybe they should wake up.
No matter how illusive the American Dream remains, 74% say they still believe America is a place where people can succeed. Of those earning less than $25,000 a year, 68% share this belief.
“Even though many consumers are worried about their own prospects for success, they have not shaken the belief that the American Dream remains a very strong possibility,” said Bradley Honan, senior vice president of StrategyOne. Click here to read more about the survey.
October 19, 2010
(Al-this is Dan Martin-we spoke about ethics and religiosity this summer. Here is a blog I wrote 7 months ago-I’ll send the hyperlinked version.)
Every day, just like me, you wake up and start making judgments. How does your ideology change the way you see the world? Your attitudes? What do you think when you pass by that homeless encampment at the Civic Center? Public opinion polls find most people support equality but see income distribution as being unfair in society. At the same time they see our economic system to be highly fair and legitimate. Ironically, dominant groups and the dominated seem to share beliefs that justify the status differences (caste, socioeconomic status, or class hegemony) we see around us.
I became interested in ideology as an adjunct to my work in human resources selection management and bias (the impact of racism, prejudice, sexism, homophobia, etc on selection, compensation and mentorship). Stereotypes help ideologies justify inequality in social systems by providing the reasons why some are at the top (intelligent, hardworking) and others aren’t (lazy, irresponsible). I’ve started to use these perspectives in my current stream of research.
Sidanius and Pratto (among others) developed the concept of social dominance orientation (SDO) to establish how individual ideology plays a role in maintaining stratification in society. SDO is the level of one’s desire “that one’s in-group dominate and be superior to out-groups”. Individuals who rate high on SDO Scales typically “become members of institutions and choose roles that maintain or increase social inequality” and those who rate low on the SDO scale tend to fill roles that serve the oppressed, known as “hierarchy attenuating” roles.
For example; Sidanius, Pratto, Martin, Stallworth, (1991) found that students in “power” disciplines (i.e., business and law) were found to have higher levels of consensual racism and SDO than students in other areas (humanities and social sciences); and consensual racial attitudes made significant contributions to choice of major.
As part of my research stream I modeled a mentorship program, and then randomly manipulated the perceived race of the protégé (Perceived as black or white). Mentorship is a critical predictor of career success. When I analyzed the data from 100 business students and 100 psychology students, what did I find? As you probably expected, business students had very low expectations when their expected protégé was black, and higher expectations when the protégé was white. The opposite was true with psychology students and SDO moderated both. What this means is that black protégés could expect less mentorship time and lower expectations of the outcome before they had ever even met their mentor (thus less access to career advances). Some things never change, and this relationship is represented across the globe between the haves and have nots.
Now I know you are thinking, great, how does this relate? There is a clear need to understand the impact of discrimination in high stakes work decisions and their subsequent impact on hierarchies. What this means is we all need to check our expectations as we begin the New Year and do the difficult work of thinking through stereotypes, our contribution to the status quo, and reinvigorating our willingness to accept our place in society. Right? Left? Centrist? Do your emotions, actions and thoughts follow suit? How do you feel when you pass those folks on Market street? Did they try hard enough? Just get lazy? Were they veterans? Victims of diminished opportunity for the masses? Revisit and mull. Play internal archeologist this year and find what we take for granted and accept.