Both Democrats and Republicans stress that the ability for people to move up the economic ladder to build better lives is at the heart of the American Dream. But new data from the Pew Center on the States pits the Republican tenet on economic mobility against another deeply held Republican belief that unions are a heavy and evil anchor on the economy that must be cut away.  

Where there is a strong union movement, there is more economic mobility. If unions are strengthened, upward mobility will increase.

In the past generation, the rich did get richer and the poor did get poorer, according to a new report from the Pew Center on the States . Project manager Erin Currier of Pew's Economic Mobility Project says the report, " Pursuing the American Dream: Economic Mobility Across Generations ,"

calls into question the quality of the opportunity Americans believe exists in the United States.