From Get and Take to Give and Offer - Renovating the American Dream

It is clear something is not working in North America and I do believe it has all to do with the bill of goods we have been sold via the main-steam marketing machine. This idea that we need to fill up from the outside in; that we need to continually consume; that we need to have more, and more, and more in order to be truly happy has brought us right into the nightmare once called the American Dream.

If you doubt my assertion that the American Dream is a nightmare look at these finding from the recently published UN Report on Poverty in the United States;

?               40 million Americans live in poverty; 18.5 million live in extreme poverty; and 5.3 million Americans live in “Third World conditions of absolute poverty.”

?               “In 2016, 18 per cent of children (13.3 million) were living in poverty, and children comprised 32.6 per cent of all people in poverty.”

?               In terms of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) states, the U.S. has the highest youth poverty rate and the highest infant mortality rate.

?               “On a given night in 2017, about 21 per cent (or 114,829) of homeless individuals were children.”

Here are the recent statistics on wealth distribution;

?               “The share of the top 1% of the population in the United States has grown steadily in recent years. In 2016 they owned 38.6 per cent of total wealth.”

Our insatiable addiction to things material has brought us to this important point in time.

What to do?

Change the dream!

What could the new world dream look like? What would you include in this dream for the future? Send me your ideas and I will undertake to collect them all in a World Dream for Future Generations.

Warmly and with gratitude

Stephen