American Dreams: Opportunity and Upward Mobility

In an increasingly polarized political environment, the first year of the new president’s term will be especially challenging. With a fresh mandate, however, the first year also offers opportunities that may never come again. The First Year Project is a fascinating initiative by the Miller Center of the University of Virginia that brings together top scholars on the American presidency and experienced officials to explore the first twelve months of past administrations, and draw practical lessons from that history, as we inaugurate a new president in January 2017.

This project is the basis for a new series of digital shorts published as Miller Center Studies on the Presidency. Presented as specially priced collections published exclusively in an ebook format, these timely examinations recognize the experiences of past presidents as an invaluable resource that can edify and instruct the incoming president.

Contributors: Melody Barnes, New York University * William A. Galston, Brookings Institution * Dambisa Moyo, global economist and author * Michael Nelson, Rhodes College * Margaret O’Mara, University of Washington * Robert Pianta, University of Virginia * Richard Schragger, University of Virginia * Peter Wehner, Ethics and Public Policy Center

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of Virginia Press
• Release date: Feb 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9780813940212

Book preview

MILLER CENTER STUDIES ON THE PRESIDENCY

MARC J. SELVERSTONE, EDITOR

Miller Center Studies on the Presidency is a series of original works that draw on the Miller Center’s scholarly programs to shed light on the American presidency past and present.

THE FIRST YEAR PROJECT

American Dreams

Opportunity and Upward Mobility

Edited by Guian McKee and Cristina Lopez-Gottardi Chao

University of Virginia Press

Charlottesville and London

Contents

Introduction

Longing for Uplift: Americans Want to Believe Everyone Has a Fair Chance to Succeed

Peter Wehner

Opportune Moment: The Time Is Right for the Next President to Pursue an Opportunity Agenda

William A. Galston

Pre-K Prerequisite: Ensure That Every Poor Child in America Gets Two Years of Preschool

Robert C. Pianta

City Power: The Next President Can Help Cities Boost More Workers into the Middle Class

Richard Schragger

The Long Game: The Next President Must Lay the Foundation for a Next-Generation Economy

Margaret O’Mara

Moving Up: The Next President Can Restore Confidence in the American Dream

Melody Barnes

Presidential Precedents: Oral Histories Show How Other Presidents Dealt with Opportunity Issues

Michael Nelson

Contributors

Notes

Introduction

Concerns about opportunity and mobility were defining issues in the 2016 presidential campaign, and in many ways explain the unexpected election of Donald J. Trump. Since the 1970s, America’s middle class has experienced a decline in size and overall wealth, a challenge made worse by the global recession of 2008–9. Economic shifts related to globalization and deindustrialization have also been at play. Together these factors have had significant ramifications for the nation’s sense of economic and social security, and for the bedrock of America’s working class. As the nation enters a new political phase in 2017, anxiety about the future of the American Dream will remain a central concern. How President Trump addresses this challenge—beginning in his first year in office—will be critical to the success of his presidency.

Many Americans now believe that their children face a future of vastly diminished expectations. The American promise, that a good life can be achieved through hard work and playing by the rules, no longer feels assured to many. This sense is particularly acute among millennials, with only about half believing the American Dream is still alive and well.¹ Faced with the rising cost of housing and education, decreased social and economic security, racial inequality, a competitive global economy, and changes in the very nature of work, they may not achieve the standard of living enjoyed by their parents and grandparents, let alone do better.

According to a 2015 Pew study, Americans in middle-income households have lost significant ground in the last four decades, including their status as the nation’s economic majority. More specifically, between 1970 and 2014 the share of aggregate income of middle-class households fell by 19 percent, making the pain of this sector very real.² This middle-class contraction has been particularly acute in major metro areas, where nine out of ten metropolitan centers experienced declines in their share of middle income earners between 2000 and 2014.³ Yet rural America has done even worse, a phenomenon that helped fuel Donald Trump’s rise to power. During this same period, an additional complicating factor was the nation’s unprecedented increase in wealth for upper-income households, as well as growth in the total number of lower-income families.

Unfortunately, the political discourse about such issues—much less the policies proposed and implemented—has failed to address these challenges. Our leaders have proved unwilling to ask hard questions about why the American Dream seems to serve fewer and fewer Americans, and about what can be done to secure the dream for the next generation. One result has been the political upheaval and bitter polarization of 2016.

In designing the First Year Project’s sixth volume, Opportunity and Upward Mobility, we set out to approach this issue in new and revealing ways. The seven essays that result pursue this goal from a range of perspectives.

The volume operates on two premises: first, that the same broad set of public policies has shaped the differing fates of the middle class and the poor, and second, that deep structural changes in the economy have increasingly made the insecurity that the poor have always known familiar to the middle class as well. These changes include deindustrialization, the emergence of disruptive technologies, and globalization—processes that have themselves been shaped by policy choices. Add to that profound demographic shifts, where by 2044 white Americans will no longer be in the majority, and this new reality will undoubtedly unleash new dynamics on the pursuit of the American Dream. Poverty rates vary widely by race and ethnicity, with the African American poverty rate hovering around 24 percent, compared to 21 percent for Hispanics and 9 percent for whites, and these differences create both unique constraints and opportunities that must be taken into account.⁴

How President Trump manages these challenges, and his ability to garner support from a diverse representation of the American populace, will be hugely important to his success, and legitimacy, in the first year and beyond. The essays in this volume offer a range of ideas about how the new president can pursue that goal. They include lessons from history and solutions that range from education and tax reform to the role of cities, federalism, and crafting a comprehensive bipartisan opportunity agenda.

Michael Nelson draws on the Miller Center’s Presidential Oral Histories to show how past presidents—including Jimmy Carter with the Food Stamp Act, George H. W. Bush’s Americans with Disabilities Act, and Bill’s Clinton’s attempt at health care reform—succeeded and sometimes failed when they sought new ways to promote varying forms of opportunity.⁵

Richard Schragger suggests that the new president can deploy the federalist system of governance to help cities and metropolitan regions become sites of opportunity, economic creativity, and resurgence—and to build on the progress that many American cities have already made.

Margaret O’Mara touches on a related theme in a deeply historical essay that traces how past presidential actions have created the conditions for entrepreneurship and innovation in local and regional economies (often unwittingly). She argues for investments in higher education, income security, and new technologies.

Other essays in the volume emphasize specific policy options available to the new president. Robert Pianta calls for enrolling every low-income child in the United States in two years of high-quality preschool education. Melody Barnes recommends data-driven, evidence-based first-year legislation to develop social capital and promote wealth creation for both the poor and the middle class.

More than the specific