Too often, we treat the American Dream as something that can be measured in economic data: GDP, income, home sales, and so on. Those things matter. But if that’s all we measure, we’re missing the full picture of what it actually means to live a flourishing life in America—and that’s a disconnect I believe average Americans recognize they have with economists and policymakers in Washington.
A new poll from Gallup this week should be a wake-up call for many of us in public policy. They report that American optimism has fallen to a record low.
Fewer Americans today expect to have a high-quality life five years from now than at any point Gallup has measured — and the share of people who report they’re “thriving” has slid sharply.
- 59.2 percent of Americans expect a high-quality life in five years, down from 68.3 percent prior to the COVID-19 pandemic
- 62.1 percent believe they live a high-quality life now, down from 67.4 percent in 2017
- All three major political identity groups saw declines of roughly five percentage points in future life optimism between 2021 and 2024
Those numbers aren’t just abstract metrics; they capture a mood that many of us already sense in our bones: something about life in America has felt off for years, and the average person can’t quite put their finger on what it is. We see it nostalgic yearnings constantly, whether it is the depictions of childhood in the 1990s or family life in the 1950s.
At FREOPP, we know that freedom and opportunity, and the hope and optimism that accompany them, include not just material prosperity, but stable relationships, meaningful social ties, and a civic life that invites participation and strengthens our communities and our country. We are farther from that fuller dream than many realize — or care to admit — and those shortfalls fall especially hard on poorer Americans.
FREOPP scholar Michael Tanner sheds light on this problem in a new paper, “Vicious Cycles: Social Isolation and Poverty.” Tanner lays out why social isolation and loneliness deserve to be front-and-center in any serious agenda for opportunity, especially in light of aforementioned Gallup data. His white paper documents rising isolation, shows how it disproportionately affects the poor and the young (especially young men), and traces how isolation produces economic, health, cultural, and civic harms.
Put simply: the country’s falling optimism and growing loneliness are two sides of the same problem. When people feel disconnected—when they lack close friends, stable family ties, or civic anchors—they are more likely to struggle economically, to suffer worse health, and to withdraw from institutions that sustain community life and add happiness. Conversely, neighborhoods and families that are tightly knit generate social capital that supports work, childcare, mentoring, and healthy civic participation. The stakes are high because the harms compound: poverty makes isolation more likely, and isolation makes escaping poverty harder. Tanner reports:
- The number of Americans who say they have no close friends has quadrupled since 1990
- Lower-income Americans are far more likely to express feelings of loneliness or social isolation
- 31 percent of those age 18–29 report feeling lonely all or most of the time, and time online is increasingly replacing social interaction.
Young people in particular show alarming signs of strain. Time-use data and multiple surveys show that younger cohorts spend less time in companionship and report higher rates of loneliness than prior generations; the consequences for marriage, family formation, and workforce attachment are profound. If a large share of the next generation grows up atomized and pessimistic about their prospects, the institutions that sustain upward mobility—stable families, civic groups, workplaces that mentor, and local religious and community organizations—will weaken alongside them.
So what should we do about it? The answer is not a single program or slogan; it’s a two-track approach that respects human freedom while recognizing a legitimate role for public policy.
- Redesign the safety net so its stop existing as a series of sterile transactions and becomes an entry point into social networks that support stable work and family life. States and service providers should adopt “one-door” approaches that bundle benefits with pathways to job coaches, mentoring programs, faith-based and civic organizations, and local community groups. That makes social connection an explicit goal of anti-poverty strategy rather than an afterthought.
- Be honest about how government can inadvertently crowd out civil society. Large, top-down programs can displace the local institutions that cultivate relationships and reciprocity. Where possible, policy should devolve power to families, neighborhoods, and civil-society actors and prioritize local over distant administration—not out of hostility to government, but out of realism about which institutions are best at knitting people together.
At the heart of this argument is a simple, sometimes politically unfashionable point: young people do best when they grow up with stable relationships at the center of their lives. Two-parent families, more stable marriages, and vibrant civic institutions are not mere moral posturing; they are engines of prosperity and fulfillment. They provide supervision, social capital, and networks that connect young people to mentors, employers, and civic life. Strengthening these institutions — culturally and through policies that remove barriers to family stability and encourage local community engagement — should be central to any serious agenda for opportunity.
The decline in national optimism underscores how urgent this agenda is. Economic indicators alone won’t restore a sense of hope if Americans continue to feel disconnected and unsupported.
If those of us in public policy and economics seek to change more hearts and minds, we must meet the American people where they are, and understand the American Dream to mean more than a bigger paycheck. We must treat social connection as essential infrastructure: the relationships, institutions, and local networks that enable people to flourish.
Policy can—and should— help. This space can be discomforting for those who have traditionally kept to tight lanes of economics and the law. But at FREOPP, we’ll continue to lean into addressing this challenge, and hopefully pave the way for more leaders to do the same.
In freedom,
Akash Chougule, President