The Horatio Alger Myth

The Horatio Alger myth comes from ideas set out in the novel Ragged dick. The myth states that young boys can rise from a poor social class into a higher one, succeeding in life and creating forms of great wealth. Horato Alger’s story is very much a rags to riches tale, embodying the key concepts of the American dream.

http://www.chabotcollege.edu/learningconnection/wrac/online/essays/Exampleargumentessaytwo.cfm

This webpage comes from an American collage, showing an essay in which the question “Using evidence from the essays in your textbook, make an argument concerning the potential for Americans to achieve success (“the American Dream”) through education” was asked.

The essay sets forth to evaluate both sides of the argument in relation to the Horatio Alger myth. Is starts by looking at the positive associations towards the myth. The first being that “the Horatio Alger myth is one of the oldest myths in the history of the United States of America” thus providing “The “hope for everyone who isn’t raised in a wealthy environment.” Children who grow up with nothing are still able to believe in the myth in an optimistic sense in which “hope” is a key factor in believing the Alger myth, as to come from nothing it is a comfort to many to believe that dreams can be achieved through hard work.

The riverside to the argument however states that “the poverty level is simply too high for the “Alger Myth” to be anything other than a fairytale.” The levels of which poverty are stated are “14 percent of the American population – that is, one of every seven – live below the government’s official poverty line (calculated in 1996 at $7,992 for an individual and $16,209 for a family of four) (Rereading America 321)." the essay goes on to condradict the Horato Alger myth as for many of those in poverty they continue to work hard and not achieve the American dream. The essay says that they work “just as hard if not harder than anybody in the upper-class and are reduced to living in poor conditions with little to no chance of every escaping the situation they are in.” This being the realty for the majority of Americans living n poverty, not the idealist dreams of Horato Alger.

The essay concludes by drawing on the Declaration of Independence, in which “The United States of America was supposed to be a country where every man and woman was treated equally” this not being the case as there is still a strong class system and wealth certainly has its advantages. The ending sentence sums up that the Horatio Alger myth as it is merely a “false myth that in many ways does more harm to the lower-class than good.” This idea clearly shown in the strong opposition within the essay.