The Bill We Pay: The Modern American Dream

Written by: Anthony R. Sissine, Jr.

Somewhere between the rent portal, the insurance denial, the tax "correction," and the gig app that swears you're "independent," the American Dream got turned into a system—and the system learned how to charge you for every mistake it makes.

I picked up a woman in San Antonio one night around eleven. North side, near the

medical center; one of those neighborhoods where the streetlights work but the sidewalks don't. She got in the back, gave me the address, didn't say much at first.

Late thirties, maybe forty. Tired in that specific way people get when they've been

working all day and the work isn't done yet.

We drove in silence for a few minutes. Street lights. Late-night taco trucks still open. A guy walking his pit bull. San Antonio after dark—familiar, repetitive, quiet in a way that isn't quite peaceful.

Then she started talking.

"You ever rent?" she asked.

I said yeah.

"Then you know," she said. "You know how they get you."

She was a barber, told me she'd been cutting hair for fifteen years, same shop, good clients. But this wasn't about work. This was about her apartment.

She'd been living in the same complex for over a decade. Same unit. Never missed a payment. Not once. But her complex had switched to a new payment system. Some app. Some platform. Automated. Efficient. Modern. You couldn't pay the old way anymore; no checks, no money orders, no walking into the office and handing someone cash.

Everything had to go through the system now.

And the system didn't care about her pay schedule.

She got paid biweekly.

The app expected rent on the first of the month, no exceptions, no grace period, no conversation. Her paycheck hit on the third. Two days late. She called the office. Explained it. Asked if she could just pay when the check cleared— like she always had before, back when there was a person you could talk to.

"It's not us," they told her. "There's nothing we can do."

The portal slapped on late fees instantly, and corporate policy treated any missed deadline as a lease violation.

A week later, she got the notice.

Vacate by the first of the year.

She wasn't angry when she told me this.

She was just… tired. Like she'd expected it.

Like this was just how things worked now.

"I don't even know if I can fight it," she said.

"I don't know who I'd fight. It's not a person. It's just… the system."

I didn't know what to say.

I wanted to tell her it wasn't legal, that she had rights, that she could talk to a lawyer. But I didn't know if any of that was true. And even if it was. what then? She'd have to take time off work she couldn't afford to lose, to fight an algorithm she didn't understand, against a company that had more money and more patience than she did.

So I just said, "I'm sorry."

“It is what it is,” she said, like she’d practiced saying it.

We pulled up to her place. She thanked me, tipped three bucks on a twelve-dollar ride, and got out. I watched her walk to a door that, in a few weeks, might not open for her anymore.

I sat there for a minute before I picked up the next ride.

***

That wasn't the worst story I heard driving. It wasn't even the most dramatic.

But it stuck.

Her story felt small—until I realized it wasn't.

Because I'd heard versions of it before. And I hear them still.

The nurse who worked doubles and still had a $5,000 deductible that reset every January, so every winter she was back to rationing insulin until she hit the threshold. The vet who did two tours and spent eight months waiting for the VA to schedule a follow-up for the knee that didn't bend right anymore. The college grad with a degree in marketing driving Lyft because every entry-level job wanted five years of experience and paid thirty-five grand a year. The guy who applied to two hundred jobs in three months and got maybe ten real responses—the rest were scams, or bots, or companies that weren't actually hiring.

Different people. Different problems. But the same exhausted, defeated tone.

I did what I was supposed to do. It didn't matter. And no one will help me.

If you've ever argued with a portal, refreshed a payment page three times, or sat on hold wondering if you're crazy for thinking it shouldn't be this hard just to live your life—this is for you.

After a while, you start to notice the pattern.

It's not that people are lazy. It's not that they're not trying. It's that the systems that are supposed to work—that we're told work, that we pay to work—don't. And when they fail, there's no one to call. No one with the authority to override the algorithm. No one who gives a shit.

Just the system. Just the policy. Just no one in particular.

And the system, it turns out, doesn't care if you've been a model tenant for a decade. It doesn't care if you're three days late because of a paycheck that's outside your control. It doesn't care if you're sick, or broke, or trying your best.

The system just is. Cold. Automated. Unaccountable.

And you. We. Are expected to adapt to it. To bend. To accept that this is just how things are now.

The American Dream isn't dying because people stopped working.

It's dying because the systems that should reward work have become too expensive, too incompetent, and too unaccountable.

We pay for everything. We own nothing.

We follow the rules. And the rules don't protect us anymore.

This essay is my attempt to answer the question I've heard over and over, late at night, in the back of this car:

I did what I was supposed to do. Why isn't it working?

***

When did everything become a fight?

Not the good kind of fight—not the kind where you're working toward something,

building something, competing for something worth having. The other kind. The

exhausting kind. The kind where you're just trying to exist without getting screwed, and

even that feels like a full-time job.

Rent isn't a transaction anymore. It's a negotiation with an algorithm that doesn't know your name, mediated by a management company that won't override it even when you've been a model tenant for ten years. You pay. You follow the rules. And the moment the system hiccups, the moment your paycheck lands two days late, or the portal glitches, or the automated email goes to spam, you’re fighting to keep a roof over your head.

Healthcare isn't just paying premiums. It's fighting the insurance company to cover what they already agreed to cover. It's fighting the hospital over bills you don't understand, itemized charges for things you never asked for, coded in a language designed to confuse you into paying more. It's fighting for pre-authorization while you're already sick, calling the same number five times and getting five different answers, each one more exhausting than the last.

Jobs aren't just applications anymore. They're battlegrounds. You apply to two hundred positions. Half never respond. A quarter are scams—fake companies harvesting your information, or real companies posting fake jobs to make it look like they're growing, or to scare their current employees into thinking they're replaceable. The rest? Entry-level positions requiring five years of experience. Interviews that go nowhere. Offers that get rescinded. And no one—no one—is held accountable for wasting your time.

Taxes aren't just filing a return. They're fighting the IRS over mistakes they made. They already know what you owe. They have all the information. But instead of just sending you a bill, they make you figure it out yourself, and if you get it wrong—even if they told you the wrong thing—you pay penalties, interest, late fees. Meanwhile, the Pentagon fails its eighth consecutive audit. Trillions of dollars unaccounted for. And no one gets fired.

Infrastructure isn't something you pay for once and it works. It's something you pay for constantly and it still fails. Roads crumble. Bridges collapse. The power grid shuts down when it gets too cold or too hot, and people die, and the executives responsible walk away with bonuses while you're left with frozen pipes and a bill you're still paying off years later.

Every interaction with a system that's supposed to serve you has become adversarial.

You're not a customer. You're not a citizen.

You're a supplicant—begging for what you've already paid for.

And the answer you get, over and over, is the same:

"There's nothing we can do."

***

Here's the question no one wants to answer:

Where is the protection?

Not the protection of a nanny state that does everything for you. Not the protection of bubble wrap and safety nets that keep you from ever failing.

The protection of basic competence. The protection of accountability. The protection of a system that, when you do your part, doesn't actively try to fuck you.

That used to exist. Not perfectly. Not for everyone. But it existed.

If you rented and paid on time, you had some stability. Eviction wasn't a first resort for being a week late because the app didn't sync with your pay schedule.

If you paid for insurance, it covered you when you got sick. Claims weren't a full-time job you had to fight while you were already in pain.

If you applied for a job, it was real. Companies didn't post fake listings just to farm

resumes or manipulate their stock price.

If you paid taxes, the government maintained basic infrastructure. The power didn't go out and kill people because no one wanted to invest in weatherization.

If you worked hard, you could build something. A home. A family. A life. Some measure of security that wasn't one bad month away from collapse.

Now?

Every single one of those assumptions is gone.

And in their place is a system that treats you like a revenue stream, not a person. A system that runs on your exhaustion. A system that, when it fails, charges you for the

failure and tells you there's nothing anyone can do about it.The pattern is simple:

We pay for everything. We fund the results. And when it fails, we cover the loss.

We pay taxes for roads that crumble.

We pay premiums for healthcare that denies our claims.

We pay rent for apartments we'll never own, to management companies that answer to algorithms, not people.

We pay into Social Security that's projected to be insolvent by the time we retire.

We pay for a government that demands we account for every penny we spend but won't do the same with the trillions it collects.

We pay for schools that fail, for infrastructure that collapses, for a border that costs billions and secures nothing, for programs riddled with fraud that no one prosecutes, for bailouts that only go up, never down.

And when we ask —politely, exhaustedly, desperately—why isn't it working?—we're told it's no one's fault.

No one in particular.

***

Healthcare is the clearest example. If you want to understand how extraction works, start there.

The average American with employer-sponsored health insurance has a deductible of around $1,900 for single coverage. That's before co-pays. Before co-insurance. Before out-of-network charges, surprise bills, and the labyrinth of codes designed to make sure you pay more than you think you will.

If you get sick in January, you start from zero. Even if you hit your deductible last year.

Even if you've been paying premiums for a decade. The counter resets, and you're back to paying out of pocket until you hit the threshold again.

So the nurse who works sixty-hour weeks at a hospital—the same hospital that sells the insulin she needs—still rations it in the winter because her deductible reset and she can't afford $400 a month until she hits $5,000.

She works in healthcare. She can't afford healthcare.

And the people running the system? They're doing fine.

UnitedHealth Group's CEO made over $20 million in 2022. Cigna's CEO made $21

million. Their job isn't to keep you healthy. Their job is to deny your claims. And they're

very, very good at it.

The denial rate for some insurers runs as high as 30-40% for certain procedures. Denials aren't exceptions—they're strategy. Deny first. Make the patient appeal. Wear them down.

Most people won't fight. Most people will just pay.

And if they do fight? The process is designed to exhaust them.

Weeks of phone calls. Mountains of paperwork. Medical codes you don't understand. Representatives who give you different answers every time you call. Prior authorizations that expire before you can use them.

You're sick. You're in pain. You're trying to get better. And the system makes you spend what little energy you have left fighting for coverage you've already paid for.

That's not healthcare. That's extraction.

And then there's the fraud.

In 2022, the FBI uncovered one of the largest pandemic fraud schemes in U.S. history: $250 million stolen from a federal program meant to feed hungry kids. The program, called Feeding Our Future, was supposed to reimburse nonprofits and community organizations for meals provided to children during COVID-19.

Instead, the money went to fake nonprofits, shell companies, luxury cars, and real estate in Kenya, Turkey, and the United States. The fraud was so blatant, so institutional, that it became a case study in how broken oversight has become.

And who paid for it?

You did. Twice.

Healthcare fraud costs the U.S. an estimated $68 billion a year. Medicaid fraud alone accounts for roughly $86 billion annually when you include improper payments. And the money doesn't just vanish—it gets passed along. In higher premiums. In higher taxes. In a system so poorly managed that stealing from it is easier than following the rules.

And when the fraud is exposed? When someone finally reports it?The media doesn't cover the fraud. They cover the whistleblower. They investigate the

person who exposed it, because they're the wrong political party, or they said something controversial five years ago, or they didn't use the right tone.

Meanwhile, the fraudsters are still out there. And the system that allowed it to happen is still running.

This is the same pattern, automation without accountability, extraction without oversight.

Here's what we deserve:

If we're already spending more per capita on healthcare than any nation on earth, we should at least get outcomes.

Claims shouldn't be denied by default. Fraud shouldn't be easier than compliance. And if we're funding healthcare systems abroad—if we're sending billions of dollars to countries that guarantee healthcare to their citizens—we should be able to guarantee basic care at home.

This isn't radical. This is baseline competence.

You work. You pay premiums. You get sick. The system covers you. That's the deal.

And if the people in charge can't deliver that, we find people who can.

***

And it's not just healthcare. Housing follows the same playbook.

The median home price in San Antonio is around $280,000. In Austin, $430,000. In

Boise, $480,000. And in smaller markets that used to be affordable—Wichita, Chattanooga, Toledo—prices are climbing just as fast. Wages, meanwhile, have stayed

relatively flat for decades.

In the 1980s, the median home price was roughly 3-4 times the median household

income. Today, it's 6-8 times, or higher, depending on the market.

You're not competing with your neighbors anymore. You're competing with hedge funds. In Austin, nearly 20% of home sales in recent years went to investors, private equity firms, institutional buyers, and landlords buying up entire neighborhoods to convert them into rental properties. They pay cash. They close fast. And they don't care if it's your dream home, because to them, it's just an asset.

The American Dream used to mean owning a home. Now it means competing with a hedge fund.

And if you can't buy? You rent. And rent eats half your paycheck—sometimes more.

The barber I picked up that night wasn't asking for much. Just the ability to stay in the apartment she'd lived in for a decade. The apartment she'd paid for, on time, every month, for ten years.

But the algorithm didn't care. The management company shrugged. And she was out.

Same mechanics. Different victim.

Here's what we deserve:

Housing should be a place to live, not a portfolio asset.

If hedge funds want to invest in housing, they can build new units. They can add to the supply. But buying up existing homes—converting neighborhoods into rental markets, pricing out families who've lived there for generations—that's not capitalism. That's extraction.

We need to build more. We need to make it easier to build—streamline permitting, reduce zoning restrictions that protect property values at the expense of everyone else, and stop treating housing like a speculative investment instead of a basic need.

And if you've been a model tenant for ten years, a computer glitch shouldn't make you homeless.

***

The job market operates on the same principle—friction as profit.

In 2024, Clarify Capital released a study showing that 27% of companies admitted to posting fake job listings. Not real jobs. Fake ones.

Why?

Some do it to look like they're growing—to boost their stock price or impress investors.

Some do it to harvest resumes, building databases of potential candidates they might hire someday, maybe, if they feel like it. Some do it to scare their current employees into thinking they're replaceable, to suppress wage demands and discourage people from asking for raises.And some do it just because they can.

There's no penalty. No fine. No consequences.

You spend hours tailoring your resume. You write cover letters. You research the

company. You apply. You wait. And the job was never real.

Multiply that by two hundred applications over three months, and you start to understand why people are exhausted.

The guy I picked up one night told me he'd applied to over two hundred jobs. Ten gave him real responses. The rest? Silence, scams, or ghost interviews—companies that brought him in for three rounds of interviews and then just… stopped responding.

He had a degree. He had experience. He did everything right.

And the system wasted his time.

Same deal: pay, comply, get punished anyway.

Here's what we deserve:

Real postings. Real responses. And real consequences for companies that waste people's time.

If you post a fake job, you get fined. If you bring someone in for five rounds of interviews and ghost them, you get fined. Transparency in hiring isn't a luxury—it's basic decency.

And while we're at it: entry-level jobs should be entry-level. If you want five years of experience, that's not entry-level. That's mid-career. Pay accordingly.

***

The government demands that we account for every penny we spend. If I buy a $50 hammer for work and write it off, I better have a receipt. If I get audited and I can't prove it, I pay penalties, interest, and fees.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon has failed every single audit since 2018. Trillions of dollars. Unaccounted for. And no one gets fired.

The IRS audits working-class Americans at higher rates than the wealthy. If you're a

waitress who got flagged for $600 in tips, they'll come after you. If you're a billionaire

with offshore accounts and shell companies, you've got lawyers and accountants who

make it too expensive to pursue.We're expected to be accountable to them. But they're not accountable to us.

Same answer: "Nothing we can do."

Here's what we deserve:

The government should account for what it spends the same way it demands we account for what we earn.

If you can't pass an audit, you don't get more funding. If you lose $21 billion in

Afghanistan, someone gets fired. If fraud is easier than compliance, you fix the system,

not the whistleblower. This isn't complicated. Every business in America has to balance its books or it goes under. The government should meet the same standard.

***

We told an entire generation: go to college, get a degree, and you'll get a good job.

So they did. They took on debt that can't be discharged in bankruptcy—debt that follows them for decades, growing faster than their income.

And at the end of it? A degree that cost $100,000 and leads to a job that pays $40,000 a year.

The average student loan debt in Texas is over $30,000. Nationally, it's over $37,000.

Total student loan debt in the U.S. is $1.77 trillion.

The college grad driving Lyft at night to make rent isn't lazy. He did what he was told. He followed the rules. And the rules didn't work.

Same mechanics. Different debt.

Here's what we deserve:

If every other kind of debt can be discharged in bankruptcy, so can student loans.

And if universities are going to charge $50,000 a year, they should be accountable for outcomes. If your graduates can't find jobs that pay enough to cover their loans, you don't get federal funding. You don't get to keep raising tuition while delivering degrees that don't lead anywhere.We also need to stop pretending that everyone needs to go to college. We told an entire generation to get degrees, and now we have a shortage of electricians, plumbers, and welders—jobs that pay well, that can't be outsourced, and that don't require six figures of debt.

Trade schools. Apprenticeships. Paths to middle-class stability that don't require a four- year degree and a lifetime of debt.

That's not anti-education. That's pro-reality.

***

In February 2021, the Texas power grid failed. Temperatures dropped below freezing.

Millions of people lost power. Hundreds died. The economic damage was estimated at nearly $200 billion.

And why did it happen?

Because the people responsible for managing the grid prioritized profit over resilience.

Because regulators didn't regulate. Because weatherization standards were optional, and when companies decided it was cheaper to risk failure than to invest in upgrades, no one stopped them.

And who paid for it?

You did. In frozen pipes. In ruined homes. In lives lost. In energy bills that are still higher years later.

That's not a failure of the free market. That's a failure of governance.

And it's a failure we pay for.

Roads crumble. Bridges collapse. Water systems in cities across America still have lead pipes—Flint, Michigan is just the most famous example, but the problem is everywhere.

We've already paid for this. We pay taxes specifically for infrastructure. And it's falling apart.

Not because we don't have the money. Not because the work is impossible. But because there's no accountability.

Same pattern—automation without accountability, extraction without oversight.

Here's what we deserve:Funding tied to results.

If the infrastructure fails, the people responsible lose their jobs. If the power grid can't handle a cold snap, the executives who cut corners don't get bonuses—they get

prosecuted.

We don't need more spending. We need the money we're already spending to actually work.

***

Look, I'm not asking you to agree with me on immigration policy. I'm asking: can we at least agree the system we have now doesn't work for anyone?

We're spending billions on border enforcement. We're warehousing people in detention centers that cost taxpayers $150-$200 per person per day—more than many hotels. We're creating a system so slow, so backlogged, that asylum cases take years to process.

And meanwhile, cartels are making billions trafficking people and drugs, because our system is too broken to stop them.

Whether you want a wall or an open door, I think we can agree on this: the system should work. It should be fast. It should be fair. It should treat people with dignity. And it shouldn't cost us billions while cartels laugh all the way to the bank.

Right now, we're getting the worst of both worlds: expensive, inhumane, and ineffective.

We're paying for security we're not getting and humanity we're not providing.

Here's what we deserve:

A system that processes cases quickly. A system that treats people with dignity. A system that actually secures the border instead of turning it into a profitable industry for private detention companies and criminal organizations.

Fast. Fair. Humane. Effective.

That's not radical. That's baseline competence.

And if the people in charge can't deliver it, we find people who can.

***

And then there's what's coming.I picked up a truck driver a few weeks ago. Fifty-two years old. Been driving for thirty years. He told me autonomous rigs are already being tested in Texas. "What am I supposed to do when my truck drives itself?" he asked.

I didn't have an answer. Neither does the government.

AI isn't science fiction anymore. It's here. And it's going to reshape the economy in ways we're not ready for.

Customer service is being automated. Legal research, medical diagnostics, creative work—all of it is being handed over to algorithms that don't need health insurance, don't take vacations, and don't ask for raises.

And what's the plan? There isn't one. No retraining programs. No safety net. No serious conversation about what happens when millions of jobs disappear and there's nothing to replace them.

We need to decide, as a country, whether technology serves us or whether we serve it. If automation is going to displace workers, we need retraining programs that actually work.

We need to make sure the gains from automation don't just go to shareholders—they go to the people whose jobs are disappearing.

This isn't about stopping progress. This is about making sure progress doesn't leave half the country behind.

***

So why did this happen?

How did we get to a place where every system feels designed to extract from us instead of serve us?

The answer is simple, and it's not an accident of technology.

It's a triumph of design.

The people writing the rules used to work for the companies they're supposed to regulate.

And when they're done "serving the public," they go back to those same companies.

It's called regulatory capture. And it's everywhere.

The FDA official who approves a drug goes to work for the pharmaceutical company. The FCC commissioner who deregulates telecom goes to work for Verizon. The politicians who write housing policy own rental properties.The fox isn't just guarding the henhouse. He designed the henhouse. And he owns stock

in it.

And even when there are rules, they're not enforced. Or the penalties are so small they're just a cost of doing business.

The system isn't broken. It's profitable when broken.

A company posts fake jobs? No fine. No penalty. Just… nothing.

A landlord illegally evicts someone? Good luck fighting it in court with a lawyer you can't afford.

An insurance company denies a valid claim? You can appeal—if you have the time,

energy, and resources to fight while you're already sick.

A corporation commits fraud? They pay a fine that's a fraction of what they stole. No one goes to jail. The executives get bonuses.

When the IRS makes a mistake, they collect interest. When the insurance company denies a claim, they keep the float. When infrastructure fails, the contractors still get paid.

Friction isn't a bug. It's a product.

The system punishes individuals for mistakes and rewards institutions for crimes.

We've also privatized everything—and then acted surprised when private companies

optimized for profit, not service.

Rent payment systems that don't account for human circumstances. Healthcare claim systems designed to deny, delay, and frustrate. Job application systems that treat people like data points, not humans.

And when it fails?

"There's nothing we can do."

No one is responsible. No one can override it. The algorithm is both judge and

executioner—and it has no mercy.

Here's the truth:

The system isn't broken. It's working exactly as designed—for them, not us.Both parties had total control at different points. Neither fixed it.

Healthcare? Still broken.

Infrastructure? Still crumbling.

Immigration? Still a mess.

Jobs? Still precarious.

Housing? Still unaffordable.

It doesn't matter who's in charge. The donors stay the same. The lobbyists stay the same.

The system stays the same.

And we keep paying for it.

***

Here's what we owe each other.

Not as a policy platform. Not as a political party. But as a basic agreement about what a functioning society looks like.

Citizens owe the government: Taxes. Honesty. Participation. We show up. We do our part. We follow the rules.

The government owes citizens: Competence. Transparency. Accountability. The systems we pay for should work. The people in charge should be held responsible when they don't.

Competence is a moral issue.

When government fails—through incompetence, corruption, or indifference—citizens

pay more than once. Once in taxes. Again in lost opportunity, broken trust, and stolen dignity.

If you pay taxes for roads, the roads shouldn't crumble.

If you pay premiums for healthcare, the claims shouldn't be denied by default.

If you rent for ten years without missing a payment, a computer glitch shouldn't make you homeless.

If you work full-time, you should be able to afford a place to live.If the government demands accountability from us, we deserve accountability from them.

This isn't perfection. This is the baseline.

And right now, we're not even getting that.

We've done this before. We built the interstate highway system. We put out fires. We delivered mail to every address in the country, no matter how remote.

Competence isn't impossible. It's just not profitable.

Here's what accountability looks like in practice:

Healthcare: Claims are approved unless there's a legitimate reason to deny. Fraud is prosecuted like the crime it is. And if we're funding healthcare systems abroad, we

guarantee basic care at home.

Housing: Build more. Limit institutional investors from converting neighborhoods into rental markets. Make ownership achievable, not a luxury reserved for the already-

wealthy.

Jobs: Real postings. Real responses. Penalties for companies that post fake jobs or waste applicants' time. Transparency in hiring.

Taxes: The government accounts for what it spends the same way it demands we account for what we earn. Audits apply to everyone, not just the working class.

Infrastructure: Funding tied to results. If it fails, someone gets fired. Measure outcomes, not inputs.

Border: Fast, fair, humane, effective. No more billion-dollar detention centers. No more years-long backlogs. A system that works.

Education: Student loan debt should be dischargeable in bankruptcy. Universities should be accountable for outcomes. And trade schools should be valued as much as four-year degrees.

Technology: AI should serve the people, not just the shareholders. If jobs disappear, we retrain. If gains are made, they're shared.

This is basic.

This is what you get when you pay your taxes, follow the rules, and do your part. And if we can't get this—if the people in charge can't deliver basic competence—then the system is failing.

***

I still drive.

Late nights, early mornings, weekends. Same streets. Same conversations. Same

exhausted faces in the rearview mirror asking the same question.

And I still think about that barber. About the vet, the college grad, the guy who applied to two hundred jobs. About the truck driver wondering if his rig will drive itself. About the hundreds of people who've told me some version of the same story:

I did what I was supposed to do. Why isn't it working?

The answer is simple: the system isn't designed to work for us anymore. It's designed to extract from us.

But here's the thing:

We don't have to accept that.

We can demand competence. We can hold people accountable. We can build systems that actually serve the people who pay for them.

It won't be easy. It won't be fast. But it's worth doing.

Because the American Dream isn't a slogan. It's a promise.

And right now, that promise is broken.

We can fix this. But only if we stop pretending incompetence is inevitable and start demanding that the people we elect—and the systems they run—actually work for us.

We refuse the silence. We demand the override. We insist on a person, not a process.

No one's coming to save us. Not the politicians. Not the corporations. Just us.

And maybe that's the point.

Maybe the American Dream was never supposed to be handed to us. Maybe it was

supposed to be something we built—and defended.

Eventually, The barber got out, tipped a few bucks, and walked toward a door that, in a few weeks, might not open for her anymore.

We're all walking toward doors that feel less and less like ours.

It's time we stopped knocking politely.