Op-Ed: “Trump and the Revolt of the White-Collar Proletariat”
The New York Times has published an opinion piece by Thomas Edsall, analyzing President Trump’s connection to the white-collar working class that propelled him to the presidency. Edsall argues that Trump’s background as a wealthy businessman and landowner conceals a history as a regular working person who sought success at the highest level of capitalist society. Edsall delves into the socioeconomic dynamics that characterize the Trump voter, and how it has downplayed the far-reaching disparities of wealth in the nation in favor of those who have concentrated power and marginally better access to the American Dream. Trump has mobilized his voters through his “Make America Great Again” slogan, appealing to a powerful sense of identity and nostalgia among overlooked constituents in the fog of matters of widespread employment and wages per hour. Such voter demographics have been historically subjected to a lessening situation of hopelessness on account of a major exclude, which has been thereby deferred or hidden by the elites. This piece seeks to illuminate the ways in which populism is visibly born at such economic disparities and interprets their relationship with the populist crusade of the current presidency.
Tags: opinion, usa, ideology, politics, economics, class, wealth, trump, white-collar, working-class, identity, nostalgia, employment, wages, electability, elites, populism.
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