RIGHT SPEAK: What's the Price of the American Dream Nowadays?

No idea is more central to Americans' outlook than the American dream — the belief that with hard work and the freedom to pursue your destiny you can achieve success and provide better opportunities for your children.

Historian John Truslow Adams, who coined the term, called it "the greatest contribution we have made to the thought and welfare of the world." It has inspired millions of people from every corner of the globe to come here in search of liberty and opportunity.But the financial crisis, housing bust and Great Recession have caused more of us to worry that the American dream is out of reach.

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For the vast majority of Americans, there is a sense that achieving the American dream is becoming more difficult," wrote Mark Robert Rank, Thomas A. Hirschl and Kirk A. Foster in a new book,

Chasing the American Dream.

Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, in announcing a new policy to provide employees with a college education, declared: "In the last few years, we have seen the fracturing of the American dream."

In fact, three-quarters of Americans polled by the Brookings Institution in 2008 said the dream was harder to attain.

They're right to worry. An analysis by USA TODAY shows that living the American dream would cost the average family of four about $130,000 a year. Only 16 million U.S. households — around 1 in 8 — earned that much in 2013, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

In an interview, co-author Thomas Hirschl, a professor at Cornell University, stressed that for the dozens of people they surveyed and interviewed, the American dream was not about becoming one of the 1%.

"It's not about getting rich and making a lot of money. It's about security," he said. It's also as much about hope for the next generation as it is about the success of this one. "They want to feel that their children are going to have a better life than they do," said Hirschl.

In their book, the authors write that besides economic security, the American dream includes "finding and pursuing a rewarding career, leading a healthy and personally fulfilling life, and being able to retire in comfort."