GOP Wins and White Non-College-Educated Voters

 

Long believed to be the representatives of the blue-collar working man, except for a very brief period and by the slightest of margins in the 1992 and 1996 elections, Democrats have lost that constituency with unbroken consistency in every other election since 1980. 50 years ago, those workers had a voice, through their unions, but American union membership in the private sector has declined from over a third such workers back then to 6.4% today. Globalization, automation, recessions and dying industries have taken their toll. 

As the GOP’s history of fiscal conservatism has traditionally embraced big business and laissez faire politics, why have such white working-class voters embraced a party that has traditionally been their enemy? One seemingly committed to fighting expanding social programs and safety nets, occupational safety standards, and consumer protection that benefit that particular class of Americans? Indeed, fiscal conservatism left the GOP when they generated the highest, non-war time contribution to our federal deficit with a tax cut that definitely did not and will never pay for itself.

As Republicans target reducing three long-standing existing social welfare programs– Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid – that disproportionately benefit that class in order to fund the massive deficit from that huge 2018 tax cut, as they continue to fight the Affordable Care Act in court and regulatory exemptions, white working-class Americans still seem stuck on supporting Republican candidates. In 2015, the Government Accounting Office made it clear, as the above GAO chart illustrates, that almost a third of older Americans have no retirement savings or assets. Many of the rest do not have enough to retire. Republicans want to cut programs that benefit those older Americans. Still, most working-class whites believe the GOP is their party.

Republicans are increasingly viewed as the party of white people; Democrats are the champion of non-white rights, often seen as led by snobby educated do-gooders who have lost sight of how hard it is for a working-class white to make a living today. Geopolitics favor Republicans – we have a nation that allocates vastly more voting power to rural white communities than to urban centers (California and Wyoming each have two U.S. Senators). Demographics favor Democrats – diversity and massive urbanization define the American population today, a majority of minorities.

Having lost their economic stability, many in this white working-class are desperate, particularly gullible about economic promises and slogans, ready to blame whom they are instructed to blame, ready to rally to leaders ready to rattle sabers and support the military that won global power after World War II. Virtually unscathed by the devastation of that war, America became the global powerhouse, dominating every facet of global politics and economics. The world has caught up with us. We certainly did not win the Korean War (stalemate), lost the Vietnam War, pushed Iraq into Iran’s sphere of influence with a failed military effort and seem to be on the verge of coming out of a 17-year conflict in Afghanistan with nothing to show for it.

We’ve lived on the investments of past generations of Americans without funding the necessary continuing improvements and repairs – the basic requirements for continued economic success – in education, infrastructure and research. The GOP continues to roll out its “trickle down” economic program, touting tax cuts for the rich as success, even though that Reagan-era mantra didn’t work then, failed when Governor Sam Brownback in Kansas tried it a few years ago and the 2018 corporate tax cut (from 35% to 21%) generated a trillion dollars of stock buybacks but funded virtually no new investment capital. Indeed, fiscal conservatism left the GOP when they generated the highest, non-war time contribution to our federal deficit with that 2018 tax cut that definitely did not and will never pay for itself.

Globalization was a huge issue for most of recent history. American labor, particularly in industries that could move overseas, was just too expensive to be globally competitive. Americans would not, at any price, perform stoop labor in agricultural fields, man slaughterhouses, or generally perform back-breaking menial labor. Undocumented immigrants would. 

But Republicans have embraced a politics of blame to target globalization (what happened to free-trade?) – which is not remotely the job-robbing nasty it once was (today, it’s automation) – immigrants and liberal elites. They scream “America First” – but those tax cuts were not for most Americans (only their rich elite) – and promise to return those now-obsolete blue-collar jobs (replaced by automation or are in industries that are no longer viable) to full pay by “Making America Great Again.” They are experts as slogan-hooks without the slightest chance of delivering on their underlying message. As a backstop, they have also embraced social conservatism, hidden under a mantle of white Christian values, just in case their economic plans fall short (which they always do except for the rich).

But is Donald Trump such a catastrophic president that he just might be enough to pull some of those disenfranchised white working-class voters back into the Democratic fold? Clearly reflective of the popular vote, the set of 2018 mid-term victories that massively shifted the House of Representatives towards blue would seem to provide support for that notion. That voters are increasingly younger and more diverse also explains that change. But the Democrats are wildly split into left-wing progressives, those torn in the middle and more traditional equality-seeking moderates.

“For Democrats looking to retake the White House, few midterm election results provided a bigger thrill than victories in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — the once-blue states Donald Trump won by excruciatingly narrow margins in 2016, in large part because of support from white, working-class voters.

“Enough of those voters came back in 2018 to deliver victory to Democratic governors and U.S. senators across the industrial belt. Now as a big field of 2020 presidential candidates takes shape, Democrats face an urgent question: Who, if anyone, can keep those voters in the fold?” Los Angeles Times, February 3^rd. Most of the announced 2020 Democratic candidates are from that progressive faction, more liberal elites. Are liberal elite philosophies finally mainstream or does a voice of the working man matter? It may not.

Still, there is one hat that may be entering the ring that believes otherwise: “Sherrod Brown of Ohio, a progressive third-term senator with strong ties to organized labor, thinks he may be the answer.

“Little known outside his home state, Brown has gained attention while exploring a presidential bid because he sees a void in the field: ‘You’ve got to talk to workers,” he said after meeting with union members Saturday [2/2] in eastern Iowa. ‘I don’t think anybody’s done that loudly enough, strongly enough and emphatically enough.’… In 2018, he was the only Democrat to win statewide in Ohio, holding the support of tens of thousands of Trump voters in a state Hillary Clinton lost by 8 points…

“Keeping a focus on blue-collar issues is easier said than done when many in the progressive wing of the party are animated by social issues such as LGBTQ rights and immigration policies to the left of the views held by many working-class families.

“Noting that a large share of Democrats’ 2018 victories were built on increasing support from upscale, suburban women, Republican pollster Bill McInturff said, ‘The energy inside the Democratic Party and their issue focus suggests they have moved on from competing for white, working-class voters, especially men.’… But Democratic strategists argue that even if Democrats can’t win back all the voters who moved to Trump in 2016, they can’t give up the fight to hold a share of the white, working-class vote.” LA Times.

We are a diverse nation, perhaps with irreconcilable differences. Upward social mobility has been relegated to the history books. Income inequality is accelerating. We are beginning the next generation of massive job displacement through artificially intelligent automation with plenty of anxiety but absolutely no plan. Trump’s program has failed and is likely to provoke more long-term damage unless he is contained, but do the Democrats actually have a viable alternative? America needs leaders, not poll-watchers or tweeters. Who is out there who just might be able to lead?

              I’m Peter Dekom, and the “one true thing” is that there are no slogan-simple answers.