Revisiting the American Dream

The Gray Area with Sean Illing

Vox Media Podcast Network

Society & Culture, News, Politics, News Commentary, Philosophy

4.6 • 10.8K Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2023

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In America, there's been an increase of available jobs, and there's also been a series of high-profile layoffs, strikes, and calls for unionization. The social safety net for workers is disappearing, so what can people do? Sean Illing speaks with Alissa Quart about her new book, Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream, about why people need to rid themselves of the American Dream's individualistic ideals and embrace dependence in order to succeed. Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling), host, The Gray Area Guest: Alissa Quart (@lisquart), author of nonfiction and poetry, and co-creator of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project References: Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream by Alissa Quart (Harper Collins, 2023) Squeezed: Why Our Families Can’t Afford America by Alissa Quart (Harper Collins, 2019) Tailspin: The People and Forces Behind America’s Fifty-Year Fall–And Those Fighting To Reverse It by Steven Brill (Penguin Random House, 2018) Enjoyed this episode? Rate The Gray Area ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Subscribe for free. Be the first to hear the next episode of The Gray Area. Subscribe in your favorite podcast app. Support The Gray Area by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts This episode was made by: Engineer: Patrick Boyd Editorial Director, Vox Talk: A.M. Hall Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Arkady Astrovsky and the host of a new podcast from the economist called Next Year in Moscow.
0:05.6	For many Russians, Vladimir Putin's full-scale innovation of Ukraine also felt like an attack
0:11.2	on their own country's future. Hundreds of thousands fled. I've been talking to this new
0:16.8	exiles because their stories helped bring to life the mystery of why this senseless war
0:21.6	began and how it might end. Next year in Moscow from the Economist is out now on your podcast
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1:03.5	How we work in this country is changing, and there are a lot of competing narratives
1:08.7	that attempt to explain why. For example, in January, it was announced that America has
1:15.5	the lowest unemployment rate since the spring of 1969. But around that time, we were
1:22.0	also hearing this. Google's parent company Alphabet announcing today it will cut 12,000
1:28.3	positions. The tech giants biggest ever round of layoffs come during the same week that
1:33.6	Microsoft and Amazon also announced job cuts. Zoom announcing it will lay off 1,300
1:40.1	workers that's around 15% of its workforce. Media companies are laying off workers too.
1:46.4	Even consumer giants like Walmart and Pepsi are reportedly trimming staff.
1:50.8	Zuckerberg has called this the year of efficiency. Sources again telling Bloomberg that thousands
1:57.6	of employees can be kind of soon as this week.
	...

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