Why Social Media Influencers Are The New American Dream
Jake and Logan Paul clearly aren’t for everyone. They’ve been accused of crimes, derided by memes, and the subject of multiple attempted cancellations. Jake Paul’s music video “Everyday bro” is the 16th most disliked video in the history of YouTube.
But whatever opinions, it’s hard not to be impressed by their rise to stardom. Coming from relatively humble means with little formal education, they’ve created a massive audience on social media. The Paul Brothers aren’t your average influencers. They exist in a rarified category of “self-made” internet stardom. The ascent is nothing short of remarkable.
It all started with posting videos on the now-defunct platform Vine, quickly amassing over 5 million followers. When Vine was shut down, they pivoted to YouTube. Here they grew by leaps and bounds, expanded to other social media platforms, eventually being offered a show by Disney, and then to their own entertainment collective called Team 10. The rest, as they say, is history. Growing through a combination of risky stunts, music videos, and a foray into pay-per-view boxing, the brothers now boast a combined net worth of nearly $70M.
While few others have reached that level of success, the attempts to follow a similar path have become popular. From cooking gurus on YouTube, to Gamers on Twitch, to real estate no-hows on LinkedIn, there’s no shortage of niches and opportunities. Being an influencer all comes down to creating, nurturing, and ultimately monetizing one’s online presence.
For The Pauls, and other successful internet stars, their stories are inspirational. They also follow an eerily familiar storyline: Seemingly ordinary people rising to higher economic strata based on their hard work and perseverance. They form the kind of ascendent storyline reserved for the fables of Americana; iconography that forms the bedrock of culture. Fuel for America’s morning mantra: “If they can make it, so can I”.
Indeed, the influencer story has come to mirror the American story to such an extent that it may actually be displacing it. Are influencers the new American Dream? Let’s dive in.
Economic Mobility and The American Dream
The classic American Dream is rich in mid-century idealism: a devoted family, steady job, and a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence that ties everything together. Over time, the end goal has shifted. People want different things and have different visions for their lives. But the essence of The American Dream - a cultural faith in hard work, meritocracy, and upward economic mobility - remains.
Put simply, it’s the promise of upward mobility. The idea that if you work hard, you’ll be rewarded with success.
As we’ve seen, there are many issues with the idea of the purely “self-made man”. We seem to naturally discount the role of luck in their own successes. But nonetheless, this idea of rugged, entrepreneurial individualism became core to American culture. And with every new success story, the faith strengthened. As the mid-century writer, Irvin G. Wyllie wrote, “The legendary hero of America is the self-made man”
And during this post-WW2 mid-century boom, there was no shortage of success stories. Americana was in full force, and economic mobility was roaring. The middle class expanded rapidly and was served by a growing array of thriving mass-market brands. Indeed, the numbers don’t lie: Of children born in the 1940s and 1950s, a whopping 90 percent earned more than their parents.
Since this “golden era”, however, upward mobility has stalled. Manufacturing jobs were shipped overseas or automated, making it harder and harder for one to achieve prosperity through hard work alone. Building prosperity through blue-collar work became increasingly difficult, and a college degree soon became a crucial requisite. In 1971, 93 percent of working-class men without a college degree were employed. In 2017, that number shrunk to 68%.
All told, economic mobility has slowed and stagnated since this golden era. Of children born in the 1980s, only half surpassed their parents’ earnings. It is also harder to climb from poverty to affluence than the popular belief in upward mobility would suggest. Most who are born poor do not even get a glimpse of the middle class. Of those born in the bottom 5th of the wealth distribution, only around 5% rise to the top 5th.
The essence of the American Dream is that, regardless of circumstance, one can rise on the basis of their own hard work. However, very few Americans in aggregate actually show a “rags to riches” trajectory that typifies The American Spirit.
What this means is that there is a massive vacuum left by the failings of traditional paths towards upward mobility. Research indicates that faith in traditional jobs and higher education are lowest amongst young, coming-of-age Americans. And yet, the drive for upward mobility, and the promise of betterment through determination, remains as forceful as ever.
But through which mechanism can these ambitions be harnessed? Enter The American Influencer Dream.
Why Social Media Influencer is The New American Dream
In 2019, polling data captured the changing ambitions of young Americans. Unlike those of previous generations, teenagers weren’t so interested in roles like doctors, professional athletes, or even movie stars. Instead, “social media influencer” topped the list of most desirable professions. In fact, 54% of young Americans expressed the desire to be an “influencer”.
When the report came out, it sent shockwaves to parents everywhere. Is this what we’ve become as a society?
But given the downward trends of upward mobility, this shouldn’t be entirely unexpected. As discussed at the onset, the modern world of influencers offers a path of personal betterment which, in the modern era, is unseen within the traditional economy.
It’s also worth noting that, for most of its history, The American Dream was only a dream for “American”, narrowly defined. It’s mid-century glory days were from the pre-Civil Rights era after all. But the modern influencer dream? It’s a climb that isn’t mediated by government or regulatory restrictions. This is not to say that bias - algorithmic and otherwise - doesn’t exist, but compared to traditional paths, the success of an influencer is determined by the market. If one’s content and platform is valued, they win. If not, they don’t. It’s as free-market as it gets.
Unlike economic measures, good data isn’t as available for influencers. This is partly due to the fact that a universally agreeable definition of “influencer” doesn’t exist. This can mean anything from part-time content creator to Kim Kardashian, and everything in between. As a result, we don’t actually know how many “make it”, from those who attempt it.
However, the actual effectiveness as a source of economic betterment is secondary. This is because The American Dream is a persistent cultural ideal. Research indicates that declining rates of economic mobility have done little to damage faith in The American Dream. Roughly seventy percent of Americans believe the poor can make it out of poverty on their own, compared with only 35 percent for Europeans. This is despite the fact that actual rates of economic mobility are much higher in many European countries than they are in America.
This disconnect isn’t completely surprising. The American Dream is a culturally embedded belief it can come true for you. It’s what Plato described as a “noble lie,” a belief that, though untrue, sustains civic harmony by inducing citizens to accept certain inequalities as legitimate. As we’ve seen, it’s perhaps never been less true now than it ever has, and its persistence, against the grain of the economic facts, is a testament to its centrality within American culture.
Final Thoughts on The Influencer Dream
Success then, need not always be realized in order for this dominant aspirational narrative to be maintained. All that’s needed are a few rarified examples to point to and say, “if they can make it, I can make it”. The American legend, after all, is the self-made man.
In the modern era, no one fits this image better than Logan Paul. In his post-fight interview against Floyd Mayweather, he distilled this perfectly: “I don’t want anyone to tell me anything is impossible ever again. This proves that the odds can be beat. Everyone has it in them. Everyone can beat the odds and do great things in life.”
The American Dream, in all of its modern glory, is alive and well.
Photo by Ian Dooley on Unsplash
About the author
Matt Johnson, PhD is a researcher, writer, and consumer neuroscientist focusing on the application of psychology to branding. He is the author of the best-selling consumer psychology book Blindsight, and Branding That Means Business (Economist Books, Fall 2022). Contact Matt for speaking engagements, opportunities to collaborate, or just to say hello
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