What Does It Mean To Be American?

Being American means that you have freedom to do whatever you believe in. In America you can express how you feel about any topic and you won’t get punished for it. For example, in some countries if you talk bad about the leader, then it’s possible that you would get executed immediately.

In an article written by Samantha Smith on Pew Research Center, Smith talks about how there are fewer Americans who think that being wealthy is an important part of achieving the American dream than there are people who think the American dream is more about having freedom and a good family. I believe that there are a lot more people who would rather have a good family and have freedom. In the same article it says that 40% of people think that being wealthy isn’t important when they think about the American dream. I think that one of the main reasons immigrants come to America is because they want to have a fresh start at life.

Lewis Borck and D. Shane Miller, who wrote an article called “Indigenous people invented the so-called ‘American Dream’” on a website called The Conversation, say “the actual term American Dream was popularized in 1931 by the businessman and historian James Truslow Adams.” He thought that the American Dream meant that you were bettering everyone around you, not just yourself. Over 14,000 years ago, the people who first came to America also came here to search for a better life. The American Dream has always been around.

23% of people think it is was common to start poor, work hard, and become rich, according Erik Sherman who wrote an article called “77% of Americans don’t believe in the American dream” that was published on Forbes. If only 23% of people think this then what does everyone else think? I think that if you want to accomplish the American dream then you’re going to need to work hard to get to where you want to be. If you aren’t going to work hard then you are most likely not going to achieve anything. Personally, I think that if your family has a lot of money and then you inherit that money, then you aren’t really achieving the American dream.

Heather Long from The Washington Post said “A big Wall Street firm is betting that America is likely to become the United States of Renters.” After people graduate from college it is possible that it is hard for them to find a career that has to do with what they went to college for. It seems like there are a lot of people who blame the fact that there aren’t very many jobs in the United States on immigrants. I don’t think this because most of the time when immigrants come over they aren’t going to go straight to college. One way that we could solve this problem would be to encourage people to go to college for things that have a high hiring rate.

Carla Javits wrote an article published on Huffington Post, where she says “all of us as individuals and as representatives of business, government, philanthropy, and nonprofits must reconsider what we do and how we do it, change, and find new ways to work together.” This is important to do so that everyone is helping each other out so we can all achieve the American Dream. According to Joe Waters who wrote an article published on Investor’s Business Daily, “children born to poor families start life at a severe disadvantage.” If a child is born into a family that is already in poverty it is unlikely for them to get out of it. This is showing that the American Dream is harder to accomplish than most people think.