The American Dream Our Parents Built Feels Out of Reach. So We’re Redefining It
The realities of adulthood have forced a generation to rethink what it means to "make it
Credit: HipLatina | HipLatina
The American Dream used to have a formula. You work hard. You get educated. You get a good job. You buy the house with the white picket fence. You get married. You have at least two kids. You accumulate wealth, and then you retire.
I grew up watching my Dominican-American immigrant parents achieve this dream. They worked hard. They educated themselves by going to college—my dad, in fact, went farther than most of his siblings, attending NYU dental school and becoming a dentist. He married his teenage sweetheart, my mom. He bought the literal white house in a pretty suburban part of Queens—so suburban that public transportation isn’t exactly reliable there. He had three kids, two cars and a dog. And he set us all up so that one day my siblings and I could have the same.
But as an older millennial who worked hard and dedicated my entire adulthood to becoming a successful journalist, only to now find myself in between jobs and hanging by a thread, I know I’m not alone in this. So many people I know today—millennials, Gen-Zers, and especially Latines—have told me the American Dream feels like a false promise.
My immigrant grandparents came to this country when my parents were just teenagers, believing life in America would be better than what they were leaving behind in the Dominican Republic—and for them, it absolutely was. The America they arrived in—my dad in 1970, my mom in 1972—was abundant. It was easy to get a job, even two or three if you needed them. Both of my grandfathers bought homes for less than six figures within a few years of living in the States, and neither spoke a lick of English. I grew up in the ’90s and early 2000s, and the things my dad could afford to provide—like paying for my siblings to attend private school—are things so many of my friends who are now parents have no idea how they’ll swing.
I was raised to believe that in America, you could do whatever you put your mind to. The world was your oyster, and with enough willpower, discipline, and determination, you could have it all—like my parents did. But the world isn’t the same anymore, and neither is America. Because of that, so many young Latines are not only grieving the American Dream we were sold but also trying to figure out what pivoting in these times even looks like.
The crazy thing is, after months of unemployment and underemployment as a struggling freelance writer barely making ends meet, part of me still believes things can turn around at any moment—that despite what so many other Americans and I are going through, I can still achieve my biggest dreams in this country. And apparently, I’m not the only one hanging on to this last ounce of delusional optimism.
According to a new Pew Research Center poll, 27% of U.S. Latinos believe the American Dream no longer exists. Even among those who still believe it’s possible, 43% say it has become much harder to accomplish than it was for our parents’ generation.
The problem isn’t that millennials and Gen Z stopped wanting the things our parents wanted. The cost of achieving those things has changed dramatically. We entered adulthood in an economy where a college degree no longer guarantees the stable, middle-class career it once did, even as the cost of earning one kept soaring. Housing prices—including rent in many American cities—climbed faster than our salaries. Childcare became so expensive it’s out of reach for many parents. Healthcare costs kept rising, and the cost of living, down to the price of our food, has been extremely difficult to keep up with.
For millennials especially, many of us were just kids and teens when 9/11 happened. We came of age during or shortly after the Great Recession and its crashing market—around the time I was graduating from college. Many of us watched our parents lose jobs or money in their businesses, drain their retirement and savings, or, in some cases, lose their homes. Gen Z inherited many of those same economic pressures, compounded by a pandemic that disrupted their college years and early careers. The result is a generation told to work hard, pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, and get ahead—only to discover that hard work is no longer enough.
Perhaps that’s why so many of us feel utterly exhausted by the pursuit of success. Our parents’ and abuelos’ generations were asked to sacrifice for a future they could reasonably expect to achieve.
Millennials and Gen Z, however, have been asked to sacrifice for a future that keeps moving further and further away. Many of us went to college, took unpaid internships, and worked our way up the corporate ladder, only to discover we still can’t achieve half of what the generations before us could. Instead, we’ve spent our adult lives watching the rules change in real time: jobs becoming less secure, layoffs so common we’re almost numb to them, degrees far more expensive, housing slipping further out of reach—even six-figure salaries aren’t enough in certain cities. We aren’t necessarily less ambitious than our parents were. We’re just exhausted and burnt out from working harder for milestones that keep getting less attainable, and increasingly skeptical that reaching them will deliver the kind of security we were once promised.
Our parents’ American Dream was often about arrival: becoming homeowners, establishing financial stability, and giving their children opportunities they didn’t have. For many of us, though, the dream is less about arriving somewhere and more about maintaining what our parents achieved, with less.
Lately I’ve been asking myself whether the old American Dream formula still works—and if not, what we should be striving toward. What should we be doing? I honestly don’t think the answer is to stop dreaming altogether. I also disagree with those who say the only way out is to become an entrepreneur or an influencer. As someone with plenty of entrepreneurs in my family and friend groups, I can honestly say it comes with just as many obstacles as working for a company—just a different set. But I do believe we need a new definition of the “American Dream,” or at least a new definition of progress that doesn’t hinge on hitting every milestone our parents were told would prove they “made it.”
I think it starts with not comparing ourselves to previous generations and accepting that many of these milestones—career success, wealth, homeownership, even having kids—are happening much later in life for many people. It also means redesigning what success means to you, which may not include homeownership or children at all. We need to stop treating the absence of these traditional milestones as evidence that our lives aren’t progressing. Sometimes success is getting out of debt, building a six-month emergency fund, landing a job that won’t destroy your physical and mental health—as my last one did—or building a life that doesn’t completely revolve around work. Maybe it’s finding a partner later in life and having just one child after 40, or not having a child at all. Maybe it’s renting instead of becoming a homeowner so you can invest your money elsewhere.
For our parents’ generation, much of the American Dream was about creating security. But today we know that degrees and six-figure salaries don’t necessarily grant it. I had those things—and I’ve also experienced enough layoffs to know that a single layoff, rent increase, or medical bill could undo my financial security.
I don’t think the question is how I make more money, or even how I get back to what I was earning when I was employed. I think the real question is: how do I make my life more resilient in a country where income, career, and housing security are no longer guaranteed? That question is far more realistic and helpful than pretending we can all easily recreate what our parents achieved. I’m also trying to give myself a lot more grace these days, because the reality is that we can’t keep acting like our individual behavior can somehow solve structural forces we don’t control. The American Dream—no matter what some politicians try to tell us—was NEVER just about our individual efforts, or even about discipline and determination. It also depended largely on the economic environment of the time, and that’s the part we often forget. I think it’s time we redefine what success and “making it” look like right now. I’m not exactly sure what that means for me yet, but even in the midst of my own career crisis and financial turmoil, I have to believe that my life can still turn around for the best.
