Quite brilliant!

I happen to be a big fan of Steve Cutts' work; he also did the rather marvelous animations for Moby's "Are You Lost in the World Like Me?" from a couple of years back (link at the end of this comment).

The "American Dream" has really turned into a strange caricature of its former self. I sincerely believe there was a time when that dream was something real to aspire to... embodied perhaps by what we might call "Mom and Pop Capitalism" in which you could have a good idea, start a business (or just "work hard") and live comfortably in the burbs with your 2.3 kids, two cars and an annual vacation to Florida or Disneyland.

But that doesn't exist anymore. The "goalposts" — as it were — were moved, and eternally moved slightly out of reach to keep us striving for something. But what? I would submit that the very "machinery" we constructed to build everyone a better quality of life depends on this thing called continuous economic growth in order to keep itself alive. So we are trained to eternally "want" and strive for more, rather than ever sit down and recognize that we have enough. And it's bad, because under the current paradigm, "enough" basically relegates you to the ranks of underachievers and losers. So social pressures as well as the "growth machine* keeps pushing us further and further into the rat maze.

Getting out is hard, because you have to change your entire mindset, and be willing to go against almost all the societal messages.

If you haven't already seen it, I expect you'll also enjoy this... for different reasons: