The American Dream Isn’t Dead

It is again fashionable to claim that America is finished. Every generation does this. In the 1930s, we couldn’t compete with the fascists and their snazzy uniforms. In the 1960s, we lacked the cohesiveness of Soviet society. In the 1970s, the Arabs owned us. In the 1980s, it was the Japanese. In the 1990s, it was the BRICs who would run the world... or that economic powerhouse the Eurozone (bum bum buuuuum!). In the 2000s, it’s been China. Boogey oogey oogey.

Never happened, never will.

How can I say that? Because America is different. Americans are exceptional. What makes us exceptional? Americans believe in the power of the individual to change the world. No one else believes that. And what that causes is millions of Americans to set about changing the world themselves.

Americans are constantly in motion compared to other people. Americans are problem solvers. They see something they think they can do better and they do it. The rest of the world waits for the authorities to fix the problem. We invent, we build, we rebuild, we tinker, we take risks. And in the end, we make the world better.

So what brings this up? Well, I ran across an interesting statistics the other day that I think highlights this perfectly. The statistic in question showed that 80% of American’s wealthiest business owners ($3 million or more) are self-made and 78% got their wealth through a business they created as compared to investment or salary. That is incredible if you think about it.

Indeed, contrary to the view of the left (or the goings on in feudal lands like Europe or Japan) that means that the people who get rich in America do so based on their own initiative rather than being handed money from a long dead relative. In other words, our rich are rich because they did something to make the world better. They are the direct result of what happens in America when you have a great idea and you take a risk to make that happen.

And how many millionaires are we talking about? Well, it’s actually harder to estimate than you would think, but people estimate that there are about 11 million millionaires worldwide with about 60% living in the US. The rest are spread out (in order) in Japan, Germany, China, Britain, France, Canada, etc.

The US has more millionaires per capita than other countries too. We have an estimated 0.6% of our population in that group, compared to 0.4% in Europe and around 0.1% everywhere else.

Add this to the fact that there are 24.7 million small businesses who create around 70% of all new jobs in the US, and what you get is a picture of the continuing vibrancy of the American spirit. In other words, Americans continue to write their own destinies... accidents of birth are not destiny in this country.

And it’s actually the younger people who are leading this.

Generation X and Y millionaires earned their money faster than older generations and they’ve proven to be more generous. According to Fidelity, which studied the issue, Gen X and Gen Y millionaires give around $54,000 a year to charity, whereas baby boomers donate only $12,000. 82% of Xers and Yers also volunteer or serve on boards of charities... only 49% of boomers do that. Again, these are people who don’t just hoard money, they put it to work to make things better. That’s a great sign for the future.

Look, our economy has some problems: overregulation, government interference, a tax scheme that hurts innovation and creates a disincentive to work or invest, a welfare system that creates a disincentive to work, and some crony issues that seem to rig certain parts of the economy to favor those with influence. But America is, was and always will be bigger than that. America remains a place where you can achieve the American dream if you’re willing to try to achieve it.