It would be nice if we could start the new year with a clean slate and a working government.
Unfortunately the government is probably as broken as it ever has been.
It doesn't seem likely that any big issues are going to get solved soon, so we will probably stumble along until the next big election in 2020.
Still, this is still a country of opportunity, although unfortunately, more and more, unequal opportunity.
It starts very young as the school you go to and the education you get is dependent on how much money your parents have and where they live.
If you grow up in a place where drugs and gangs offer the best path to success (at least material success) you are more likely to follow that path.
In many ways they are the perverted image of the American dream where anyone with skill, determination and luck can start at the bottom and rise to the top.
Assuming they survive and avoid prison.
Those two things provide plenty of vacancies on the way up.
Its a high risk path as opposed to the path in wealthy suburbs where students are groomed for the best colleges followed by traditional success opportunities.
Unfortunately most American occupy the area between these two strata, forced to overcome significant hurdles to get an education and often left with crippling student debt.
I've seen some recent studies that indicate success in life is more predetermined in America than it has ever been in the past. There is still some social mobility, just a lot less of it.
You are likely to end up pretty much in the same circumstances as your parents, with the exception of second generation immigrants.
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