San Antonio College Library

Percy and Beverly face their fading dreams of retirement before gathering their family together for a holiday meal. Emilia tries to keep up Christmas traditions in the midst of her deepening financial crisis. Hilton takes unpaid time off from his cafeteria job at Google to accompany Diana to doctors' appointments for complications in her pregnancy.

Hilton juggles two full-time jobs, and returns home at night to the one-car garage he calls home in the heart of Silicon Valley. Jose and Elizabeth try to qualify for a mortgage, Emilia reveals a troubling part of her past, and DJ and Takita try to start over in a new neighborhood.

A surprise on the housing front leads Jose to think about his future with Elizabeth in a new light. Hilton and Diana prepare for the birth of twins, while Hilton works hard for a promotion at work. Emilia pounds the pavement for a better-paying job. DJ fears recrimination at work for his union activity.

DJ steps up his union activity, Jose and Elizabeth put everything on the line to improve their living situation and Emilia gets an unexpected call about a job opportunity. Percy gets a $1.50/hour raise at a new custodial position and Takita prepares for a celebration at church.

"In Home from Nowhere Kunstler explores the growing movement across America to restore the physical dwelling place of our civilization. Picking up where The Geography of Nowhere left off, Kunstler describes precisely how the American Dream of a little cottage in a natural landscape mutated into today's sprawling automobile suburb in all its ghastliness, and why "we are going to run shrieking from it to a better world." He locates in our national psychology...

What a cultural movement that began to take shape in the mid-twentieth century erupted into mainstream American culture in the late 1990s, it brought to the fore the idea that it is as important to improve one's own sense of emotional well-being as it is to manage depression and anxiety. Cultural historian Daniel Horowitz's research reveals that this change happened in the context of key events. World War II, the Holocaust, post-war prosperity, the...

Using the latest social, economic, attitudinal, and demographic data, this book tells us where we've been, where we are, and where we are going. This upbeat and incisive look at American life will surprise the doomsayers and encourage everyone who is looking for the facts instead of the myths about the state of the union promoted by the media. -- Book Jacket.

"The contributors to this volume investigate to what extent welfare has increased in the United States over the postwar period and provide a rigorous examination of both conventional measures of the standard of living." "This volume answers the question posed by the title and will be of interest to economists, sociologists, policymakers and policy analysts, as well as students of these fields."--Jacket.

In this indictment of consumerism, de Graaf et al. treat the social problem they call "affluenza" like a disease, discussing symptoms, treatment, and causes for this "painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more." Individual, social, and environmental effects, historical causes, and solutions are detailed. The book is based on the TV documentary of the same name...