The American Dream – Part 2

I had been thinking in terms of a home in the suburbs being the American Dream. At the YMCA this morning, a friend said the automobile should be added, or included, as a part of that dream.

It’s difficult to imagine living in the ‘burbs without a horseless carriage. They represent a major part of the problem.

Don’t forget that, despite what logic, observation and projections tell me, my comfort level out here in Dreamland is relatively high. That is, I am certain, a feeling understood and shared by most Americans.

Part 1 covered some, not all, of the of the most obvious financial considerations of our overemphasis on the detached, suburban house as the focus of our savings. The damage done is, of course, not limited to the financial.

How about your health? Could the American Dream be partially responsible for us having shorter lifespans than people living under conditions that don’t fit into our dream?

There are those pesky cars. Sucking their tailpipes for an hour or two five days a week is not quite as good for your health as hiking the Appalachian Trail, except perhaps politically.

Everyone who enjoys commuting in populated areas raise your hands. That time may be productive for the Arabs and Japanese but probably not for you. You just can’t get away from the financial aspects here. The money diverted to unproductive energy usage is immense and immensely stupid.

The houses themselves are also villains. Since we waste so much energy commuting from our dream home to the place that underpays us, we look for savings elsewhere. Oh, yeah. Let’s see if we can save some energy in our homes.

Well, we can’t save all that much when we have to have that 70-inch diagonal flat screen with the 17 speaker sound system requiring a couple of thousand watts of amplification. But, we can slap on some more insulation.

Don’t forget to stop any warm air escaping via the doors or windows. Make that little box airtight.

Oops, that means breathing bad air. Although it varies considerably from place to place, if you have a problem with radon, you have a choice of a slow death from it or freezing to death, which I have been assured is usually quicker. And then there is always the possibility of other gasses seeping into the house from the landfill on which your house was built.

Oh, no. Your house might make you ill and you think about all of that money directed to the American Dream leaves a little less for healthcare.

You own the American Dream, or do you? I would posit that the reality is that your home owns you. How many couples are delaying a divorce because they can’t sell the house and neither party can afford it on their own?

Your career requires a change of location but your house keeps you where you don’t want to be. The employment situation is not as stable as it once was. You have to be more flexible now in many different ways than your parents even considered. Can you take that pay cut and still afford that hour commute, the gasoline, if it jumps back to $4 a gallon, the parking fees, the high insurance costs that accompany all those miles?

Back in the 1960s, while living in Los Angeles, I read the story of five aircraft engineers whose jobs left town. They found new jobs . . . in San Diego. I think that was 125 miles or so away. They couldn’t sell their homes. They couldn’t uproot the children from their lives. They just could not afford to move. But, clever as they were, they found a solution.

They pitched in together and bought a customized van. There were four captain’s chairs surrounding a table. While they took turns driving, the others would play cards, read, sleep, eat or whatever. Their answer still forced each one to spend about 25 hours a week unproductively, away from family, away from their American Dream. That answer probably wouldn’t fill the needs of every employee in the ‘rust belt’ who was replaced by a teenage slave laborer in China.

Could we increase our investment in mass transit? Could we live just a little closer together? Could we get by without a car?

While in training in the Army after basic, I was stationed at Ft. Monmouth, New Jersey. I met a guy there to whom it was difficult to relate. He was 25 years old. He was born in Manhattan. Until he was drafted, he had never left Manhattan.

He took his basic training at Ft. Dix, New Jersey. His advanced training was at Ft. Monmouth. He did so well there that they put him on staff. He had to finally leave Manhattan but still never strayed more than an hour or so from home.

He had just about satisfied his military service requirement. He had a college degree. How could he do all of that and never own a car or live in a detached, single-family dwelling? How could he have been so nice, so well-adjusted, so happy without ever experiencing the American Dream? Maybe he was un-American. He had never had a driver’s license.

And just remember, this method of savings is based on borrowed money, 30-year commitments, betting that you can foretell the future and having that dream job that can’t be shipped over to Bangladesh.

This is just skimming the subject. However, so far, it seems evident that the more one looks at it, the less sense it all makes.

Stay tuned for Part 3.

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Tagged as: american dream, arab, automobile, borrow, car, china, commute, detached, energy, financial, ft dix, ft monmouth, gasoline, health care, home, house, insulation, insurance, japan, landfill, mass transit, parking, radon, savings, single family, slave labor, suburb, waste