Our kids : the American Dream in crisis

Resource Information

The work Our kids : the American Dream in crisis represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Cuyahoga County Public Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Our kids : the American Dream in crisis

Title remainder

the American Dream in crisis

Statement of responsibility

Robert D. Putnam

Creator

• Putnam, Robert D

Subject

• Equality -- United States
• United States -- Economic conditions
• American Dream
• Social mobility -- United States
• Social classes -- United States
• United States -- Social conditions

Language

eng

Summary

"It's the American dream: get a good education, work hard, buy a house, and achieve prosperity and success. This is the America we believe in--a nation of opportunity, constrained only by ability and effort. But during the last twenty-five years we have seen a disturbing "opportunity gap" emerge. Americans have always believed in equality of opportunity, the idea that all kids, regardless of their family background, should have a decent chance to improve their lot in life. Now, this central tenet of the American dream seems no longer true or at the least, much less true than it was. Robert Putnam offers a look at this new American crisis. Putnam begins with his high school class of 1959 in Port Clinton, Ohio. By and large the vast majority of those students--"our kids"--went on to lives better than those of their parents. But their children and grandchildren have had harder lives amid diminishing prospects. Putnam tells the tale of lessening opportunity through life stories of rich and poor kids from cities and suburbs across the country, drawing on a formidable body of research done especially for this book"--

Assigning source

Provided by publisher

Cataloging source

DLC

Index

index present

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography