Is the American Dream in Decline?

Open to Debate

Education, Society & Culture, News

4.6 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 3 July 2026

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS

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Summary

The American Dream – the idea that anyone can achieve success in the U.S. through hard work and determination – is under scrutiny, and some worry it’s no longer achievable for the broader population. Those who agree say increasing healthcare, education, and housing costs create difficulty in having financial stability. Those who disagree argue that the U.S. still offers more opportunities for personal and financial growth than elsewhere. Now we debate: Is the American Dream in Decline? This ethical conundrum is at the crux of this week's debate, originally broadcast in January 2024. Arguing Yes: David Leonhardt, Pulitzer Prize-winning Senior Writer for The New York Times and The Morning; Author of “Ours Was the Shining Future: The Story of the American Dream” Arguing No: Michael Strain, Political Economy Scholar and Director of Economic Policy Studies at American Enterprise Institute; Author of “The American Dream Is Not Dead: (But Populism Could Kill It)” Nayeema Raza, Journalist and Host of "Smart Girl Dumb Questions", is the guest moderator Join the conversation on Substack—share your perspective on this episode and subscribe to our weekly newsletter for curated insights from our debaters, moderators, and staff. Follow us on YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, Facebook, and TikTok to stay connected with our mission and ongoing debates. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:30.4	This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Hi, everybody. America's 250th anniversary comes this
0:36.5	weekend, and it's bringing with it a lot of interesting thought and conversation around some questions about particularly where we stand right now as a country, the state of democracy, and the thing we want to focus on, the American dream, that guiding belief that all of us should have the freedom and opportunity to succeed and create a
0:54.1	better life for ourselves and our families. 250 years in, how are we doing at that? Some new polls say,
1:01.0	not so well with only a third of the population saying they believe the American dream still
1:05.9	holds true. With inflation and a growing affordability crisis and young people feeling pushed out of that dream of buying their first homes, is the American dream a myth or is it something that can still come true?
1:17.3	That's the question we're reconsidering today with the help of our guest moderator, Naima Raza, my friend and brilliant journalist and host of the podcast, Smart Girl Dumb Questions, which you can listen to wherever you listen
1:28.6	to your podcasts.
1:29.9	Naima, it's all yours.
1:31.1	Take it away.
1:32.1	The American Dream.
1:33.5	It's a term that was dreamed up and popularized by the writer and historian James Treslow Adams
1:38.5	in his 1931 book, The Epic of America.
1:42.2	Since then, the American Dream has been conflated with home ownership.
1:46.1	It's become synonymous with ideas of upward mobility, meritocracy, and generational progress.
1:51.9	In 2012, 53% of Americans survey said that they believe the American dream held true.
1:57.7	Today, that number has fallen to just 36%. Almost 20% of respondents in the same
2:03.4	survey said they thought the American dream never existed. So is the American dream a mythology,
	...

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