The Good Life and Its Discontents: The American Dream in the Age of Entitlement

My review is based on the first edition of this book. I found out about this book when I happened upon an old issue of Newsweek I had kept around, from 1996. Its cover story was an article made up of excerpts from it, and was titled "Great Expectations". I read the article and found Samuelson's analysis just as prescient today as when he wrote it. I wanted to see more of what he had to say, and so I got this book. I was not disappointed, at least in the analysis department. The book is part economic history, and part sociological/political analysis. He starts with the Great Depression, describing what happened. I'm in my 30s, and I had not heard a detailed history of the Depression in school. Just that the economy was in the dumps for about 10 years, and that tons of people were poor, hungry, and unemployed, and it inspired FDR's New Deal agenda. He fleshes this out some, giving quotes from sources of the time, describing what conditions were like, and how people felt about their predicament and their future. He tries to give a psychological picture of what the Depression did to the people who lived through it. He also provides analysis about what caused the Depression, how the institutions of power groped for a solution to the problem, and that some of what they did worked, and some of it didn't. Interestingly, what he says worked was not necessarily what a lot of people thought fixed the problem. Then he moves into the post-WW II boom, the world that the Baby Boomer generation grew up in, and the psychological change this caused in people's minds about what was possible. His main thesis is that this period of time, the economic expansion from the end of WW II to the early 1970s, produced an exaggerated, somewhat distorted view of economic expectations. Part of this view was formed by what Samuelson would call mistaken notions of what got us out of the Depression. It was this time period which produced the idea that in the future, each generation would be financially and materially better off than the generation that preceded it. He calls this notion a myth, and proceeds to give his own explanation of why the expansion occurred, why it petered out in the 1970s, and why the notion that each generation would just get richer and richer has not held true. He does not blame government for failing to do its job to "make" things better. In fact he points out that government's attempts to shape the economy were based on flawed policy thinking anyway. He explains that the economy changed over time, more competitors entered the marketplace, and the idea that the entreprenuer was a dying figure in the U.S. economy did not hold true. He gives an alternative view of what has happened: that while incomes and living standards have not rapidly risen for all concerned, products that consumers buy have gotten cheaper, so in effect we've traded our former vision for making things more affordable to more people in the U.S. He also comments o

This was one of the most intelligent, original, and colorful books that I have read this year. Most of the author's points are right on the mark. The great mystery of our time for political analysts is the large gap between peoples' evident satisfaction with their own life and their overwhelming disappointment with public life. Mr. Samuelson not only is perceptive enough to point out this overlooked paradox but diagnoses it well. This will be certainly a bold challenge for the next generation of public leaders.

As someone who has to deal with many of the issues that Samuleson addresses, I can vouch for his central thesis that people have come to take progress for granted and have forgotten that there's "no such thing as a free lunch."

It is quite easy to enjoy this book. By presenting relevant statistics Samuelson provides logical, however preliminary, conclusions as to why we are disillusioned as a nation. His ideas in regards to the promise of prosperity are particularly interesting. Finally the border of the puzzle has begun to form from the implications inherent in Samuelson's contentions. Most importantly, this book provides a framework full of hypotheses and statistical starting points for future social psychological research.

This book is excellent! It is a well written book about how even though we have more than any other culture in the history of civilization we are beating ourselves up because we haven't solved every problem. It also has an interesting discussion of the impact of technology on our society and our expectations of what technology will give to us. If you are interested in politics, technology, or the psychology of the nation as a whole this is an awesome buy.It has a ton of tables and figures in the back that back up the (sometimes controversial) ideas. For example, most people are relatively happy with their life today, yet think that the majority is unhappy.