The Myth of Meritocracy

By Anonymous / Summer 2020

When I was a kid I learned to have a steadfast belief in the American Dream. The American Dream to me existed as a promise. The promise was meritocratic, that I could be anything that I wanted to be - I just had to work hard and success would soon follow. The belief in the American Dream was supported by the middle-class lifestyle I was born into. My father had a successful electrician business and I lived on a nice street in a house that my father built. However, my family lost its middle-class status when my parents divorced and I have many years of experience living below the poverty line as a child and young adult.

The first event that shook my belief in the American dream occurred while I was working at Target. I had just finished my associate’s degree and decided to take a break from college in order to figure out which bachelor’s degree I wanted to pursue. I wanted to be sure it was something I would enjoy earning and benefit from having as I expected to take on debt to earn it. I was an excellent target employee, I worked holidays and weekends, covered shifts when needed, and met every challenge put in front of me. I earned prizes and awards for customer service and signing people up for Target’s credit and debit cards. However, during my first review and raise period, I was only offered an additional seven cents per hour. All my effort and flexibility amounted to seven cents above the state minimum hourly rate of $8.25 and that came across as an insult. This amount is barely enough to cover rent and other living expenses in San Diego.  This experience broke the promise of the American Dream. Hard work alone would not be enough to succeed in American society. A living wage, a house, or a car were things not attainable while I worked there.  I learned the line of work greatly you invested your time in also determined what rewards you would receive for your labor.     

The second event occurred when my dad shared a story with me during a road trip. When the 2008 recession hit, my father took some serious financial damage. He worked as an electrician and without steady work he quickly fell behind in child support payments. The government was garnishing any wages he made and the courts would regularly seize the funds in his bank account to pay off child support missed payment fees. My dad was knowledgable and hard working in a skilled trade but it was not enough. To stay afloat for as long as he did he would buy “poor man bonds.” These were post office bonds he could use as a way of protecting the little money he had by hiding the bond in one location and the receipt in another. His story exemplified the phrase “poverty is a downward spiral.” Because of his debt, he was accumulating more debt. A vicious cycle of late fees, bank overdraw fees, accumulating interest consumed more income than he could make. Although he checked off every requirement I had learned to gain access to the American Dream, with the financial floor taken out from underneath him and the psychological toll imposed on him by aggressive collection practices he tried to take his own life.

The American Dream promised that if you “pulled yourself up by your bootstraps,” you could be successful. However, the structures and pathways toward the American Dream are designed to exploit the lower class for the benefit of the wealthy and powerful classes. Stores like Target and Walmart satisfy their investors with high earnings by paying their employees the bare minimum. While the banks were bailed out during the 2008 recession, they imposed the strictest of penalties on my father. These policies did very little, halted, or event set back our pursuits of the American Dream. They contradict the meritocratic promise and exposed the inequity we contended against in the search for prosperity.