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Jessie Haas

Professor Lisa Fitzgerald

English 1

11 October 2017

The Dark Side of the American Dream

The American Dream is an ideal that has brought countless immigrants to settle in the

United States, from the earliest days of European colonization of the Americas to present day.

It is the idea that anyone can achieve social and economic mobility if they work hard enough.

Today, the American Dream has been co-opted by materialism. Rather than social and

economic mobility for the sake of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, the new

American Dream, that is, success and happiness, looks like an expensive education, a well-

paying job as a result, a nice house filled with endless gadgets, and a luxury car. Happiness

and success, as they are understood today, are materialistic perversions of early American

ideals. Our contemporary interpretations of happiness and success are counter-productive to

personal fulfilment, and encourage values and habits that hurt us, such as accumulating

possessions and the high status that come with them, rather than values that help us to truly

be happy, such as having experiences and helping people.

Humans are incredibly adaptive, and this serves us in many ways, but it also has its

downsides, especially when it comes to how quickly we adapt to possessions. One of the

reasons why things dont make us happy is that they are so easy to adapt to (Amin). Writer

Amit Amin, in his article The Hedonic Treadmill If Only Happiness Were As Easy As

Marriage, a Big House, and Kids, talks about this power of adaption and how it can hinder

your happiness if you expect fulfilment to come from acquiring possessions. The new house

or car you bought, after wanting it for so long, quickly becomes the norm. You adapt to it,

until it becomes the new normal (Amin). The advertisements dont end; there will always be
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something new to buy. The checklist of the new American Dream - an education, a good job,

a nice car, home ownership - these things do not bring lasting happiness; their happiness

shelf-life is short. One way to counter-act this is to make more small purchases, rather than

fewer big purchases, although this habit seems counter-intuitive to the American Dream

checklist. According to studies, while it is very easy to adapt to large purchases, you are less

likely to adapt to small purchases as easily (Dunn, Gilbert, Wilson 118).

In the United States, one of the largest purchases a person makes in his or her lifetime

might be education, as cost of tuition continues to grow in this country, but education itself

might not be enough to bring happiness. For many, education is the first step in what they

consider the road that leads to happiness and success, but while education can be important

for personal growth and new opportunities, studies show that the happiest people are not

formally educated (Amin). Many people go to university in order to attain higher social status

or a well-paying job (Myers 58), and these materialistic motivations can be very detrimental

to your well-being (Malbiot). Being wealthy creates the expectation of peak experiences

(Dunn, Gilbert, Wilson 119), and it is possible that being educated has a similar effect.

Ultimately, since those in the category of having the least amount of education are happiest

(Amin), it goes to show that education itself does not lead to a happy life. If you are spending

tens of thousands of dollars or more on your education with the expectation of it leading to

happiness, especially by means of status and financial success, you will be disappointed.

While big purchases dont bring happiness, having enough money to have your basic

needs met is still a critical component to happiness, although wealth beyond that does not

contribute to happiness. It is important to understand that it isnt that money has absolutely

nothing to do with happiness; money is strongly correlated to happiness so far as you dont

have to worry about getting enough to eat and having other necessities of life taken care of.

But beyond this, there is a diminished return. Those who are very wealthy are not any
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happier than those who have enough to live on and not much more (Myers 59). Psychologist

David Myers, in his essay The Funds, Friends, and Faith of Happy People, talks about how

in countries where the gap between rich and poor is large, such as in India, being wealthy

does generally predict happiness, but in countries where most citizens have their basic needs

met, such as Canada, wealth matters very little in a persons self-fulfilment (59). People have

a tendency to overvalue the effect of wealth on their happiness, and most people would prefer

to have more money, but in reality, wealth has a very weak association with happiness.

Chasing after wealth with the intention of finding happiness not only does not lead to the

conclusion that you would assume, but it can also have the opposite effect.

At best, wealth will not make us happy; at worst, valuing wealth can actually be

detrimental to your mental health and general well-being. That is, it isnt just that the state of

being wealthy will not bring happiness, but desire for wealth, or materialism, can actually

indicate unhappiness, as well as a score of other personality problems (Kasser 14-15). This

applies to both rich and poor alike (Manbiot). Writer George Manbiot, in his two articles

Materialism: A System That Eats Us From the Inside Out and One Rolex Short of

Contentment analyses hundreds of photos of young people displaying obscene amounts of

wealth on Instagram and comes to some pretty scathing conclusions. He talks about how their

desire to impress seems desperate and their lives seem hollow (Manbiot). His ideas are

backed up by numerous studies on materialism, linking the desire for stuff with

unhappiness, personality problems, and weak social relationships (Kasser 14-15). In The

High Price of Materialism, psychologist Tim Kasser states ...when young adults report that

financial success is relatively central to their aspirations, low well-being, high distress, and

difficulty adjusting to life are also evident (9). If your idea of happiness and success

involves having lots of money and spending it on possessions and other things that will bring

high status, then your mental health may be suffering because of it.
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While materialism is detrimental to happiness, there are less materialistic ways to

spend money, and buying experiences is one way that a person can utilise money to maximise

happiness. Not only does the anticipation of future events cause happiness, but the memories

you create while you experience these things hold up much more than things do (Dunn,

Gilbert, Wilson 116-117). Rather than measuring your happiness by how many material items

you own, consider reframing your idea of personal fulfilment to be about experiencing life

fully. For example, to get the most out of your extra spending money, buy a trip to the Grand

Canyon rather than a new television. Additionally, though education itself does not make you

happy, the experience of university might, as long as you value it as an experience in and of

itself. In the article If Money Doesnt Make You Happy, Then You Probably Arent

Spending It Right, another explanation for experiential purchases providing happiness is

given: mind-wandering [is] a cause, and not merely an effect, of diminished happiness. A

wandering mind is an unhappy mind, and one of the benefits of experiences is that they keep

us focused on the here and now (Dunn, Gilbert, Wilson 116). Experiences make you an

active participant in the world, stuff does not. All of your accumulated possessions will

eventually fade into the background of your life, while the experiences you have will

inevitably define who you are as a person. Experiences may not always bring the high status

that many people consider to be synonymous with success, and it is harder to see tangible

proof of your accomplishments if they are memories rather than material possessions, but

redefining your expectations of happiness to be about these experiences and memories rather

than buying stuff is one of the best things you can do for your own personal fulfilment.

Lastly, though this may seem contrary to many ideas we hold in high esteem in the

United States, happiness can lie in giving to others. Our American values often involve

bootstraps, or the idea that anyone can achieve success and happiness if they simply work

hard enough, and the logical conclusion to that assumption is that people who are struggling
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are simply not working hard enough. In reality, some people will never achieve economic and

social mobility simply through hard work, and need a little help. The good news is that giving

to others not only helps the recipient, but can also help the giver in achieving happiness.

Studies have shown that we are happier when we spend money on other people (Dunn,

Gilbert, Wilson 117). In the article If Money Doesnt Make You Happy, Then You Probably

Arent Spending It Right, the correlation between spending money on others and happiness

is examined. Not surprisingly, given the fact that humans are hyper-social animals, forming

strong connections with others is a key component to happiness (Dunn, Gilbert, Wilson 117).

One of the ways to do this is to spend money on others rather than on yourself. This can

involve gifts to loved ones, but it also includes giving to charity (Dunn, Gilbert, Wilson 117-

118). One of the dark sides of the American Dream is a tendency for an every man for

himself approach, but since having your basic needs met is a crucial aspect to attaining

happiness, it should be a priority to make sure every person has the very least that they need,

and this can even help with your own happiness.

The American Dream may have been a worthy goal at some point, but materialism

has co-opted it and turned it into something harmful. While the original ideas behind it can

still be a source for inspiration in your life, you should examine if your idea of happiness and

success are leading you to become materialistic and, therefore, hurting your chances at

happiness. Value people over things, gain experiences over possessions, and give to others.

Helping everyone to achieve their own happiness should be as much a part of the American

Dream as achieving your own.

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Works Cited

Amin, Amit. "The Hedonic Treadmill If Only Happiness Were As Easy As Marriage, A

Big House, And Kids." Happierhuman, 2017. http://happierhuman.com/hedonic-

treadmill/ (Links to an external site.)

Dunn, Elizabeth W, et al. If Money Doesnt Make You Happy, Then You Probably Arent

Spending It Right. Journal of Consumer Psychology, vol. 21, no. 2, Apr. 2011, pp.

115-125.,elearning2.uniroma1.it/pluginfile.php/101777/

mod_resource/content/1/if_money_doesn_t_make_you_happy.pdf.

Kasser, Tim. The High Price of Materialism. The MIT Press, 2002.

Monboit, George. Materialism: A System That Eats Us From the Inside Out. 2013. The

Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/09/materialism-

system-eats-us-from-inside-out.

Monbiot, George. One Rolex Short of Contentment. 2013.

http://www.monbiot.com/2013/12/09/one-rolex-short-of-contentment.

Myers, David G. "The Funds, Friends, and Faith of Happy People." American Psychologist.