By the time my great-grandfather returned to Ireland after two decades in the U.S., he’d earned enough to buy a small business. My grandmother and her siblings were sent to private school. If America was ever a story of upward mobility, then he had made it part of ours.

Stories like his still abound with the legend of the American Dream. But the arc of that story has grown harder to follow.

For young Americans today, the story sounds different: job prospects have “deteriorated noticeably” as AI replaces entry-level roles . Many of my Gen Z peers are still unemployed—or stuck in jobs that require none of the degrees they went into debt for.

The American Dream—the promise of happiness and financial success through hard work—has, of course, never truly been attainable to all. When Jame

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