The ideal of equal opportunity no longer means simply the opportunity which a man has to advance beyond his fellows.  Some of our citizens do achieve greater success than others as a reward for individual merit and effort, and this is as it should be.  At the same time our country must be more than a land of opportunity for a select few.  It must be a land of opportunity for all of us.  In such a land we can grow and prosper together.

The simple truth that we can all go forward together is often questioned by selfish or shortsighted persons.  It is strange that this is so, for this proposition is so clearly demonstrated by our national history.  During the last 50 years, for example, our Nation has grown enormously in material well-being.  This growth has come about, not by concentrating the benefits of our progress in the hands of a few, but by increasing the wealth of the great body of our Nation and our citizens.

In the last 50 years the income of the average family has increased so greatly that its buying power has doubled.  The average hours of work have declined from 60 to 40 a week, the whole hourly production of the average worker has tripled.  Average wages, allowing for price changes, have increased from about 45 cents an hour to $1.40 an hour.

We have accomplished what to earlier ages of mankind would have been a miracle—­we work shorter hours, we produce more, and we live better.

Increasing freedom from poverty and drudgery has given a fuller meaning to American life.  Our people are better educated; we have more opportunities for travel and recreation and enjoyment of the arts.  We enjoy more personal liberty in the United States today than ever before.

If we can continue in the spirit of cooperative adventure which has marked the recent years of our progress, we can expect further scientific advances, further increases in our standard of living, and a still wider enjoyment of democratic freedom.

No one, of course, can foretell the future exactly.  However, if we assume that we shall grow as fast in the future as we have grown in the past, we can get a good idea of how much our country should grow in the next 50 years.

At present our total national production is $255 billion a year.  Our working population and our output per worker are increasing.  If our productive power continues to increase at the same rate as it has increased over the past 50 years, our total national production 50 years from now will be nearly four times as much as it is today.  Allowing for the expected growth in population, this would mean that the real income of the average family in the year 2000 A.D. would be about three times what it is today.

These are estimates of what we can do in the future, but we can reach these heights only if we follow the right policies.  We have learned by bitter experience that progress is not automatic—­that wrong policies lead to depression and disaster.  We cannot achieve these gains unless we have a stable economy and avoid the catastrophes of boom and bust that have set us back in the past.