The American Dream is the promise that anyone who works hard and plays by the rules will be rewarded with the good life. With a stable home and job, Americans can raise a healthy family, build wealth, and pass it on to the next generation to make the lives of their children even richer and more secure.
That dream eroded in the new millennium. Few noticed as Wall Street banks encouraged high-risk mortgage loans, bundled them together in securities, and sold them off to investors. It looked like everyone was cashing in on the American Dream, but it soon became a nightmare.
In 2008 the bubble burst. When interest rates rose, homeowners could no longer pay their mortgages, and the securities they funded failed. Starved of revenue, Wall Street banks began collapsing. Credit that greased the engine of capitalism dried up. Business activity shuddered to a halt, and the global economy crashed. Millions of Americans lost their homes and jobs in the “Great Recession” that officially ended in 2009 but dragged on for years. It was the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
People were in shock and afraid. They lined up in the street by the thousands to apply for a few low-paying jobs. Many booted out of their homes by the banks were pushed into homelessness. But instead of helping folks on Main Street, the Obama administration bailed out Wall Street with trillions of dollars in taxpayer funds. The result was the largest transfer of wealth in U.S. history, from working people to the richest 1%.
The White House and corporations said the bailout was needed to reboot the economy. Yet, these “too big to fail” banks that profited from the housing bubble made off like bandits from the economic meltdown they caused. They notched record profits even as most Americans suffered economic decline, job losses, home foreclosures, medical bankruptcies, and declining life expectancies. The American Dream, which was still only a dream for most people, was dead.
“Banks got bailed out, we got sold out!” With the government ignoring their pleas for relief, the 99% tried something new. On September 17, 2011, a few dozen people set up tents in Zuccotti Park near Wall Street in New York City to protest. Within weeks, the movement exploded. Tens of thousands of people were living in tent societies in squares, street corners, and parks all over the country—and the world.
Occupy Wall Street was one of the most dramatic political uprisings in American history. The movement drew conservatives and anarchists, homeless veterans and small business owners, college students saddled with enormous debt and unemployed factory workers. They were pissed that Wall Street wrecked the economy, ran off with the loot, and stuck them with the check. The Occupy movement crystallized this anger and brought together all types of Americans against a common enemy. The occupiers recognized that demanding change from the top 1% was useless. By taking over public space, they experienced the warmth of genuine community, the power of solidarity, and the realization that a true democratic society would never trickle from the top down; it could only be built from the ground up by the 99%.
As New Yorkers, we weren’t surprised by the occupation in our city, but when camps started popping up in unexpected places all over the country, we (a journalist and an academic) knew we had to find out more. So we grabbed a notebook and camera, hopped in a car, and hit the road. Over the next year, we traveled to 42 occupations in 27 states to speak with hundreds of occupiers. We met with autoworkers in Youngstown, teachers in Chicago, and indigenous activists in Albuquerque. We stood on the factory floor with a worker cooperative, the frontline of home-eviction defenses, and community farms with families. From the Rust Belt to the Gulf Coast to the islands of Hawaii, we heard the stories of despair that led them to occupy, the joy they found in the Occupy community, and the hope they felt, many for the first time in their lives, knowing they were building a better future—a real American Dream—for themselves.
The Occupy phase was short lived, however. Police attacks began weeks after the movement started. Cops coordinated with federal officials, big banks, and major corporations. By early 2012, most occupations had been violently evicted from public space. Those that remained crumbled under the strain of trying to keep groups with conflicting interests united even as the camps became social service sites for people suffering from the countless ills of an unjust society. Without a shared political understanding, individual needs were prioritized over collective survival, and the remaining encampments disintegrated.
Despite the blow of losing public space, Occupy Wall Street evolved. After a devastating storm struck New York City in October 2012, Occupy Sandy helped hurricane victims with immediate aid and long-term rebuilding. Occupy Homes led direct action to defend homeowners facing eviction from illegal foreclosures. “Debt Strike” organized a groundbreaking movement against medical and student debt that won federal relief. Occupy threw open the door to new militancy and community organizing, such as the Fight for $15 movement that saw low-wage workers targeting corporations from McDonald’s to Walmart. It inspired the undocumented “Dreamers” who put immigration reform on the national agenda; NoDAPL, anti-fracking, tar sands, and mountaintop coal removal activism; and the Black Lives Matter movement for racial justice. Occupy Wall Street put the issue of rising economic inequality on the national agenda and catapulted Bernie Sanders, the long-time socialist congressman from Vermont, to nearly winning the Democratic presidential primaries in 2016 and 2020.
With the rise of Donald Trump and fascism globally in the last decade, it may seem hard to believe that millions of strangers from all walks of life took over public spaces all over the world to fight for a better life for the 99%. And amidst the destruction of government institutions and public services, and the loss of social justice victories won through decades of struggle, it may feel impossible to envision a path forward again. We hope the stories of occupiers will remind us of our shared goals of democracy, equality, and justice—and that there once was a time when we came together to make a new American Dream come true.
—Michelle Fawcett and Arun Gupta
The Occupy USA Today Media Project