American Studies Blog 9

Business Insider Article

I believe that the American Dream is still in existence, however not all are successful in making it. Although it is interesting to debate what ‘it’ is. To many having a disposable income is making it, but interestingly, can some people be living this American Dream through happiness. My article presents twelve immigrants who have ‘made a fortune in’ America. Interestingly, it refers to their income and not necessarily their ‘dreams.’ It is definite that the rich do get richer, however, not everyone who is currently rich started off rich. People like Ralph Lauren, who now has a net worth of 7.7 billion (2013), to begin with dropped out of college to join the army. The article includes stories of: Sergey Brin (co-founder of Google), Andy Grove (co-founder of Intel Corporation), Jan Koum (co-founder of WhatsApp), Jerry Yang (founder of Yahoo) and Do Won Chang, (co-founder and CEO of Forever 21).

The article states, ‘13% of the U.S. population is foreign born, for a total of more than 40 million people’. This very much reflects the time that Ragged Dick was living in, where people from all over the globe fled to America to be a success of this idea. Most of these people had the same kind of lifestyle like Dick did. They came from poor backgrounds where their parents didn’t have much money to live off. In contrast to Dick, most seemed to be in the position to gain an education, although some did drop out. In addition to this, many were rather lucky and the opportunities provided to them were successful, unlike many. Andy Grove’s story can be one to relate very much to Ragged Dick. He arrived in America with little money like a lot of European’s and had to work hard to survive. He was fortunate enough to get an education, although worked as a busboy whilst doing this. Where as he was not as good as English, he thrived in other subjects such as Chemistry. Although he made his living in California State and not New York, he was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. Much like Dick with the little boy who gets knocked overboard. Here, he became the company’s chairman and CEO of Intel Corporation. He is currently helping it towards becoming a billion-dollar company and is one of the most important drivers of the information economy. Forbes estimates that he is worth $400 million.

To conclude, I believe that the tools of becoming a part of this ‘American Dream’ are still how Horatio Alger Jr. describes in Ragged Dick. As the article writes, the key attributes are of ‘determination, grit and a bit of luck’ in order to achieve this success. Interestingly, eleven out of the twelve people who have been picked for this article are male. Which linking to Ragged Dick, implies that women are still being treated unequally, mirroring the widower and the little girl characters from the narrative.