What a fantastic question. If you mean the dream of having the opportunity to become and accomplish whatever you like, I think it is.

It is true that, to some degree, things are harder. College tuition is higher and admission criteria have gotten more narrowed. Access to capital is more difficult. And the economic slowdown hurts.

On the other hand, I think there are areas where we have really gone forward. A young person wishing to give it a go will find much less discrimination based on age or gender than he/she once would have. And communications technology has created the opportunity to scale a business like never before.

Good question though. Would be interested in your answer to the same.

No. It's being crushed by faith in government vs. faith in God. Besides the American dream is selfish to begin with.

Alive but on life support I would say. For me the strength of the American dream lies in the strength of the middle class, and ours is under siege. Rising health care costs, rising costs of education, the threat of double-digit inflation, high unemployment, all set against a backdrop of wealth consolidation in the hands of a very few.

It's all about leveling the playing field, y'know? It has never been level in this country of course, and now it seems it is growing less so.

I’d have to say that in my opinion, the American Dream is a fallacy that’s perpetuated by those in power to preserve the status quo while offering a veneer of legitimacy for the power that they wield – that same power that, ironically, is used to keep those who need a benevolent state the most, in check.

Here in the U.S., we talk about places like Sweden as if they are some backwater place filled with crazy commies and we’re conditioned to eschew all things socialist. “Do you want to be like Sweden?!?” they shrilly cry. Well, actually yes, in some respects I would.

There’s a video by Robert Reich that does a pretty decent job of summarizing the pickle we’re in, and without courageous leadership from someone willing to risk everything, I don’t see our country’s trajectory changing anytime soon.

That's an excellent question I'm asking myself all the time. We have a lot of problems, both with economy and with a difficult environment for immigrants, which might lead people to say no, it's not alive. But I think if there ever was an American dream, it is still alive. There are still a lot of opportunities for motivated people here, acceptance and welcoming of immigrants is the rule, and xenophobia the rare exception. And there are many amazing things about America that we take for granted -- infrastructure, government services, religious freedom etc.

It's alive and well to me. I started a company during the peak of the recession and it's doing very well. I think the Americans who complain about the decline of the American Dream are the ones who have forgotten the value of hard work and delayed gratification.