SACRIFICE
The Cost of Pursuing a Dream is...
What Does It Take?
Every individual who strives to pursue their dream will have to sacrifice who they are or something important to them. Each one is blinded by their dream and sees it as bigger and more important than maintaining who they are.
"Greed is Good" "Junk Mortgages Under the Microscope" and "In Goldman Sachs We Trust"
In all three of these sources, individuals sacrifice everything they are and have to pursue their dream of being wealthy. In "Junk Mortgages Under the Microscope", it is implied that in order to pursue your dreams and move up in the businesses world, you have to be dishonest and a complete fraud. "...when you rely on the underwriter and the rating agencies to do all your homework for you, you don't have safety. You have only the allusion of safety" (Sloan 49). Similar to Sloan's views of the individuals who live in the business world, "Greed is Good" shows that the dream of having a lot of money leads to being a dishonest and poor person. Money overtook them and changed these people into someone they were not. All they care about according to this article is the luxuries that come with this lifestyle. "And you are all being royally screwed over by these, these bureaucrats, with their steak lunches, their hunting and fishing trips, their corporate jets and golden parachutes" (Gekko 5). Likewise, in "In Goldman Sachs We Trust" they mention that the people of this firm were exploiting and dumping large amounts of money, showing their willingness to change their ways and sacrificing their life and everything they have worked for, for profit. "Goldman, Sachs had considerable enthusiasm for itself" (Sachs). All of these people in order to pursue their dream of being rich were blinded by their dream and did not realize all of the things they were sacrificing to be on top.
"The Great Gatsby" and "Inside Job"
In "The Great Gatsby" and in "Inside Job" everyone sacrificed who they were at the cost of pursuing their dream. Daisy lost who she was in the journey of getting more money by marrying Tom. She lost sight of who she was and sacrificed Gatsby, the love of her life. Her dream forever changed her. She once wanted love with Gatsby and then the dream of being rich got in the way. She was blinded by it and married tom because he supplied that dream for her. "I love you now, isn't that enough? I can't help what's the past,' She began to sob helplessly. 'I did love him once, but I loved you too.'" (Fitzgerald 132). Gatsby sacrificed himself for the approval of Daisy, everything he did was for her. He sacrificed who he was to be pleasing to her, all the parties, the look, all for her. And in the end, Gatsby reached rock bottom just like Wall Street in "Inside Job". Business owners, instead of being truthful business men, let money over come them and changed them to where money and materialistic items was all that mattered. "You come to us today telling us "We're sorry. We won't do it again. Trust us". Well i have some people in my constituency that actually robbed some of your banks, and they say the same thing." (Capuano). All of these people started off with a dream, they were most likely honest good people who just wanted something really bad. They pursued their dream and in exchange they sacrificed everything. Their vision for whats right and wrong, for how things are supposed to be got clouded by this "marvelous dream".