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Is the American Dream Real?

2014-03-18 · letter vlog · John · 3:33 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Economics · mode: Explainer · tags: self correction

John argues that, by mobility and pay-gap data, equality of opportunity is greater in Denmark, Slovenia and other developed countries than in the US, so the American Dream is a dream; systemic inequality of opportunity hurts all Americans.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Moving to New York in 2005: the Craigslist mover ('anyone who can work, can work') later met working in publishing

  • ★★ John recalls that when he and Sarah moved to New York in 2005, a Craigslist mover told him that in New York anyone who can work, can work. — 00:00:01 · Sarah Urist Green, New York City
  • ★ John calls the mover's line the best one-sentence summary of an efficient labor market he has heard. — 00:00:11
  • ★★ About a year later, at a publishing conference, the same man, now in international sales at a huge publishing company, greeted John as 'Looking for Alaska'. — 00:00:30 · Looking for Alaska (novel)

00:00:51 — Anecdotes vs data: intergenerational mobility in the US, UK and Denmark; the 'Danish Dream'

  • ★★★ John says American national self-understanding of the American Dream rests on anecdotes like the mover's and Andrew Carnegie's, but the actual data are less dreamy. — 00:00:44 · United States
  • ★ In an aside, John dismisses viewers who insist 'data' is plural and must take 'are'. (playful) — 00:01:05
  • ★★★ John says 42% of American men raised in the bottom 20% of incomes stay there, against 30% in the UK and 25% in Denmark. — 00:01:10 · United States, United Kingdom
  • ★★★ John says that by almost any measure, being born rich or poor predicts ending up rich or poor more in the US than in Canada, Europe or any developed country. — 00:01:19 · United States, Canada, Europe

  • ★★★ John says socioeconomic mobility and equality of opportunity in the 21st century are better described as the 'Danish Dream' than the American Dream. — 00:01:30 · United States

    “We're talking about the Danish Dream.”

00:01:39 — Economic opportunities for women: gender pay gap in the US, Canada, Australia, UK, Sweden, Slovenia

  • ★★★ John says women in the United States make 77 cents for every dollar men make in the workforce. — 00:01:42 · United States
  • ★★★ John calls the US pay gap horrifically unjust and economically problematic: people should be paid by skills and contributions, not by sex. — 00:01:47 · United States
  • ★★ John says Canada's pay gap is worse than the US's, while women make 83 cents per men's dollar in Australia, 84 in the UK, 85 in Sweden and 97.5 in Slovenia. — 00:02:00 · Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, United States

00:02:15 — Americans believe in reward for skill but the dream is not real; innovation trade-off; worry that the US will lose skilled people

  • ★★★ John says Americans are far likelier than others to believe intelligence and skill are rewarded and less likely to think family wealth is key, but this dream isn't real. — 00:02:15
  • ★★ John grants that the regulations and redistributive tax policies that improve equality of opportunity elsewhere limit innovation, partly why Apple, Twitter, Google and In-N-Out Burger began in the US. — 00:02:31 · Twitter, Google, United States
  • ★★★ John worries systemic inequality of opportunity will deny promising future innovators their chances and make the US progressively less appealing to the most skilled. (hedged) — 00:02:45 · United States
  • ★★ John says a female programmer with Slovenian and American passports is probably still best off in the US today, but if trends continue that may not hold in a decade. (hedged) — 00:03:02 · United States
  • ★★★ John concludes that systemic inequality of opportunity is bad not just for Americans living in poverty but for all Americans. — 00:03:13

00:03:19 — Shout-out to Slovenian readers, thanks for Hank's consent video, 'Esther Day?', sign-off

  • ★★ John thanks Hank for his video on consent and abuse, saying it made him proud to be his brother. — 00:03:24

In the description and comments

  • ★★ In the description John notes that, according to a study he links, female programmers in the US are in fact paid the same as male programmers, despite his programmer example. — video description · United States

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: American Dream · equality of opportunity · gender pay gap · social mobility · United States

Also: People: Andrew Carnegie · Sarah Urist Green

Works: Looking for Alaska (novel) · The Fault in Our Stars

Organizations: Apple · Craigslist · Google · In-N-Out Burger · Twitter

Rituals: Esther Day

Concepts: linguistic prescription · meritocracy

Places: Australia · Canada · Denmark · Eastern Europe · Europe · New York City · Slovenia · Sweden · United Kingdom

Also centred on American Dream: Gatsby's American Dream: Reading The Great Gatsby Critically, Chapter 1 · The Great Gatsby: Living the Dream in the Valley of Ashes · Started from the Bottom: Benjamin Franklin and Drake Compared

Also centred on gender pay gap: Is the Gender Pay Gap Real?

Replies to

Later videos replying to this one

  • 2016-02-02 · Is the Gender Pay Gap Real? (John) — corrects — “So a while back I said in a video, in the United States, women make 77 cents for every dollar that men make in the workforce.” (00:00:02)