With so many charities, non-profit organizations, political candidates, family, friends and others asking him for money, billionaire Peter G. Peterson wrote an admirable column in Newsweek on how he plans to give away his fortune to tackle the country's most pressing political and economic problems. He simply wants today's children to have a shot at the American Dream as he and his Greek immigrant father had.

I have lived the American Dream—I went to college, worked in the corporate world, served in government and became an investment banker. And that led to a second turning point, on June 21, 2007, at 9:30 a.m. That was the day the Blackstone Group—a private-equity, asset-management and financial-advisory firm that I cofounded—went public. In an hour I became an instant billionaire.

What to do with so much money? I have much more than enough, and there seems little prospect that I can take it with me. So again I turn to my father's example. When he had built a modest net worth, he gave generously to his old home in Greece and to the less fortunate in his beloved new home. Tears would come to his eyes when he sang "God Bless America." He so loved America for its possibilities.

I believe today that those possibilities are shrinking, endangering the American Dream. Personal myopia, political cowardice, fiscal fantasy and journalistic neglect are all at work. So I have chosen to put much of my wealth ($1 billion over the next several years and much of my remaining estate) into a new foundation, one that I hope will explain the undeniable, unsustainable and yet politically untouchable long-term challenges we face. Headed by The Honorable David M. Walker, who served as the comptroller general of the United States from 1998 to 2008, the foundation will propose workable solutions and build up the public will to put them into effect. I cannot think of anything more important than trying in this way to preserve the possibilities of the American Dream for my children's and grandchildren's generations, and generations yet to come.

The three problems as he sees them are the aging of the baby boomers and unattainable costs of social security and Medicare, record trade deficits passed onto future generations, and our staggering health care costs, which offer neither the best services nor coverage.

These challenges all require sacrifice. That means everyone. We fat cats will have to pay more taxes. The government will have to spend less. Everyone will have to save more. I'm not sure if we remember how to give up something for the long-term general good. Nor do we hear calls for sacrifice from our leaders. Our lawmakers are enablers, either joining us in the state of denial or trying to anesthesize us. But if we can learn to face the future realistically, everyone will benefit from a more robust, sustainable economy.

Pointing out that the "Greatest Generation" overcame a depression, Peterson is confident that today's youth will find solutions to our most pressing problems. First, we need to educate them on what those challenges are.