The Golden Age Of America

he United States of America has long advertised itself as the land of opportunity. The words vary but the overall message in the United States is the same, in this great country no goal is too big and no dream too ridiculous to pursue as long as you work hard, you are guaranteed to achieve anything you set out to do. Unfortunately, this country has kept on advertising this message even though it no longer is true. A lot has gone wrong with this nation since the end of its “Golden Age”(1945-1970s) where this message once meant something. An age where anyone who wanted to owned a home, a car, and have a good paying job could realistically have those things through hard work. Today we see high unemployment rates, high school diplomas that mean

With ever increasing prices on commodities and scarcer jobs, hard work alone is not enough to pay the bills when they are due. Imagine that you are stuck out in the ocean. The waves are pounding and every time a wave rolls in you are sucked in underneath. After surfacing you only have 15 seconds to catch your breath before the next wave hits. Over time your body starts to give out, 15 seconds is not nearly enough time to recover between each wave. You can only hold on for so long before your lungs give out and you are permanently sucked in underneath. This is what living on minimum wage feels like. People work so hard for money that barely covers their basic needs. Minimum wage is those precious 15 seconds of air that you get. It barely keeps you afloat. Americans need help to keep afloat, and the government could remedy the situation by adding more seconds(increasing minimum wage), so to speak, so that a person does not have to barely hold on, and actually make enough money to live

According to ProCon.Org a website that has been used by the New York Times and multiple US state governments, raising the minimum wage to $9 would automatically see 300,000 Americans rise out of poverty. Increasing the minimum wage another dollar and ten cents to $10.10, would see 900,000 Americans climb their way out of poverty. In raising the minimum wage to $10.10 not only would you see close to a million Americans move out of poverty, but the government itself would save $4.8 billion from reduced welfare spending (ProCon.org." Should the Federal Minimum Wage Be Increased?). Clearly it can be seen that the raising of the minimum wage doesn’t just have positive social impact, but monetary gain for the government as well. That $4.8 billion could go to community program funding or research that would promote the welfare of thousands of