- Oct 20, 2022
- 7,219
- Thread starter
- #7,261
Yet if Harris and the Democrats talk about 'the working-class', this will the be denounced as Marxist, and as hostility towards the middle-class.
Just as over here in the UK, the Labour Party is criticised if it refers explicitly to the working-class ('outdated class politics, divisive politics, anti-business', etc), but it's OK for the Tories to masquerade as 'the Party of the working-class', and accuse Labour of having abandoned the working-class in favour of 'identity politics'.
The other thing I can't get my head around is the claim/fear - cited above by previous posters - that Harris and the Democrats will increase State intervention, yet it is the Republicans who are urging bans or further restrictions on abortions, closing or defunding family-planning clinics, imposing bans on 'controversial' books in school or public libraries, blocking access to online 'adult entertainment' sites, etc.
I guess the Republicans, like many Tories and Reform UK supporters here in the UK, want freedom for themselves and people exactly like them, but discipline, conformity and punitive policies imposed on the people they don't like.
Not really - the “working class” in the US means something different from the “working class” in the UK. When we start using phrases such as “working class” in American economics, it is best to be clear what you mean. Economists in the United States generally define "working class" as adults without a college degree. Many members of the working class are also defined as middle-class. These blue collar, non-degree educated voters tend to lean towards Republican.
Much of what the American electorate understand about both the Republicans and Democrats it is how politics is presented in the media of course - The mainstream media like internet forums and social media have a natural proclivity for contentious and polarised debates.
IMO - comparing the right and left in the US with the Labour and Tories in the UK (while understandable as this is largely a British membership forum) is an unhelpful comparison - as @North Carolina Supporter said, the ‘left’ in the US is very different to our UK understanding of the ‘left’ as are definitions of ‘working class’. When we talk about ‘state intervention’ we don’t just mean in the moral and social affairs of the individual but management of the economy. America up until the 80s had a greater leaning towards laissez-faire economics than the UK which resulted in very high income inequalities which some have argued, became counterproductive to the health and stability of the American economy:
It’s argued that the “legacy of America’s great laissez-faire experiment is undermining the future well-being of America’s young workers and, in turn, their children. It is time to return to policies explicitly aimed at reducing income inequality by raising wage levels; increasing the taxation of top incomes and the regulation of the financial sector; increasing job and health security; and above all, increasing public and private investments in skills, neighborhoods, and public infrastructure.”
Probably something the Democrats need to get into their messaging in the final days of the campaign before it is too late.