How Is The American Dream Similar To Today

Fitzgerald’s rendition of the “American Dream” shows Gatsby, a financially set man who has a large mansion where parties are thrown on the weekends with other wealthy people. It also shows contrast with the character Nick, a not-so-wealthy person who is trying to achieve the American Dream. Nearing the end of the novel, it is then we realize that neither Nick nor Gatsby ended up achieving the American Dream. This all means that Fitzgerald’s version of the American dream is more similar to today's ideals. The majority of adults today think that younger generations will not be better off than they were or that the American dream does not even exist at all. Some Americans seem to think we lost our values and that this is it, you cannot achieve

Source A states that Daisy is Gatsby’s ultimate status symbol and he needs her to truly achieve his American dream. In other words, when Daisy refuses to leave Tom, and Gatsby is murdered, it is then we learn that Gatsby never achieved his dream and the novel ends with Nick’s thoughts on the American dream and its lost promise. In Source C, a man named Robert McAdams from Peru, Nebraska says “The American dream is long gone. Long, long gone. Politicians have ruined it, broken our values, sold out to folks with money who only care about themselves. Nobody cares about anyone who works with their hands anymore. We got to get this country straight again, before it all keeps sliding down into hell.” Once again, this shows that even fellow Americans today believe that there might not even be a dream at all. This reveals that many Americans seem to have “lost hope” and think that there isn't an American dream at all and if there is, it is unattainable. One might argue that if someone works hard enough, they would be able to attain the American dream. Perhaps if you do dirty tactics like Gatsby. Speaking of hard work, it does not always amount to

In Source A, it says “In the novel, Jay Gatsby overcomes his poor past to gain an incredible amount of money and a limited amount of social cache in 1920s NYC, only to be rejected by the "old money" crowd. He then gets killed after being tangled up with them.” Even after being “successful” and being able to live among the higher-ups, the new money and old money classes were still divided which didn’t allow them to fit in and live up to their full potential of success. In source E, it states “Those who live in areas with higher economic growth and better schools have a greater chance to climb the economic ladder. The studies also found that areas with large African-American populations, such as the South, have lower rates of mobility for all residents.” In other words, some people are already born with a disadvantage based on their location or class, and this does not allow them to live up to what they could have been. This matters because it shows how life is unfair, and someone may get a vast amount of opportunities simply because of the area they were born in. An opposing view could be that class doesn’t matter and that with enough blood, sweat, and tears, anyone could potentially be successful. If you are doomed from the start it will be extremely hard to exit that rut and the statistics from Source E shows it is very