by 
In
his
farewell
address,
mere
days
before
leaving
the
White
House,
Joe
Biden
made
a
dramatic
intervention.
Warning
about
how
an
oligarchy
of
“extreme
wealth,
power
and
influence”
risked
the
basic
rights
of
every
citizen,
he
even
suggested
it
could
threaten
American
democracy
itself.
Given
how
late
Biden’s
intervention
came,
to
say
nothing
of
his
typically
stumbling
delivery,
it’s
tempting
to
dismiss
his
comments
as
the
rantings
of
a
tired
old
man.
In
truth,
though,
I
think
the
speech
matters.
For
in
its
populist
appeal
to
Main
Street
over
Wall
Street,
it
reflects
the
revival
of
something
we
haven’t
seen
in
years:
class
politics.
Rather
than
appealing
to
racial
subgroups,
or
sex
or
gender
identity,
Biden
instead
spoke,
however
fleetingly,
to
those
many
millions
of
Americans
who
care
more
about
their
paychecks
than
the
colour
of
their
skin.
Nor,
of
course,
is
the
46th
president
alone.
Increasingly,
both
main
parties
realise
that
to
win
at
the
ballot
box,
they
must
appeal
to
the
middle-
and
working
classes,
as
proven
by
Trump’s
roughly
10-point
lead
among
those
two-thirds
of
Americans
without
a
college
degree.
Yet,
if
that
speaks
vividly
to
radical
shifts
across
US
socioeconomic
makeup,
it
remains
unclear
if
politicians
on
either
side
of
the
aisle
are
truly
willing
to
back
blue-collar
workers
—
especially
when
the
oligarchs
continue
to
have
such
a
grip
over
them
all.
For
all
Biden’s
warnings
about
oligarchy,
the
elite
did
very
well
during
his
tenure.
Consider
the
numbers,
with
the
wealthiest
Americans
increasing
their
collective
net
worth
by
a
remarkable
one
trillion
dollars
over
his
time
in
office.
The
monopolists,
for
their
part,
have
been
generous
in
their
turn.
In
2020,
to
give
one
example,
Biden
received
25
times
as
much
funding
from
tech
companies
than
Trump,
and
over
three
times
as
much
from
Wall
Street.
Among
electronics
manufacturing
firms,
many
of
whom
build
their
products
outside
the
country,
the
margin
was
a
remarkable
$68
million
to
$4
million.
All
the
while,
American
business
continued
to
consolidate,
just
as
it
has
for
a
generation.
The
Review
of
Finance
notes
that
three
quarters
of
industry
has
become
more
concentrated
since
the
late
Nineties.
This
has
been
most
notable
across
finance,
where
big
banks
have
doubled
their
market
share
since
2000.
The
same
is
true
elsewhere:
a
coterie
of
tech
firms
now
account
for
a
record
35%
of
market
cap.
No
wonder
only
22%
of
Americans
were
optimistic
about
the
economy
by
the
end
of
Biden’s
term,
even
as
confidence
in
his
economic
leadership
had
fallen
to
just
40%.
Taken
together,
then,
Biden’s
fall
stemmed
from
an
enormous
miscalculation.
Elected
as
a
moderate,
he
ignored
polls
that
suggested
most
Americans
were
more
concerned
with
their
economic
prospects
than
issues
like
climate
change
and
foreign
affairs,
let
alone
social
justice
manias
around
trans
rights.
Nonetheless,
the
Democrats
followed
the
lead
of
their
oligarchic
funders,
many
of
whose
biggest
contributions
have
been
focused
on
exactly
these
side
issues.
When
the
election
came,
no
wonder
so
many
blue
collar
Americans
tried
their
luck
with
Trump:
including
a
remarkable
number
of
minority
voters.
Once
again,
the
statistics
here
are
clear,
with
40%
of
Asians
voting
for
him,
well
above
the
30%
in
2020,
even
as
some
African
Americans
headed
to
the
GOP
as
well.
Blue-collar
Latinos
went
heavily
for
Trump
too.
The
point
is
that
this
realignment
largely
happened
on
economic
grounds,
with
minorities
ignoring
Trump’s
past
litany
of
racist
comments
because
he
offered
them
a
more
expansive
economy,
particularly
in
blue
collar
professions.
All
the
while,
they
saw
little
promise
in
the
tsunami
of
promises
offered
by
Harris
and
her
bozo
vice-presidential
partner
Tim
Walz.
Knowing
a
winner
when
they
see
one,
America’s
billionaires
duly
came
out
for
the
Republicans
too.
That
included
Elon
Musk,
of
course,
but
also
prominent
investment
bankers
like
Bill
Ackman.
Taken
together,
what
does
this
revolution
show?
That
class
and
economics
now
play
a
greater
role
in
American
politics
than
skin
colour
or
national
origin.
If
you
want
to
secure
minority
voters,
the
new
President
clearly
understands,
you
appeal
to
them
not
as
identity
groups
but
as
individual
people,
and
families,
looking
out
for
their
own
self-interest.
Nor
is
this
really
revelatory.
America’s
working-class
remains
more
aspirational
than
those
in
other
Western
countries.
That’s
equally
true
of
non-white
voters,
many
of
whom
appreciate
that
the
politics
of
race
is
an
impediment
to
the
American
Dream.
Most
of
the
middle-income
people
who
lately
lost
their
homes
to
fire,
in
the
minority
LA
suburb
of
Altadena,
hardly
benefited
from
a
city
government
more
obsessed
with
race
and
gender
than
protecting
property.
No
less
telling,
Democratic
policies
on
water
and
climate
have
created
what
attorney
Jennifer
Hernandez
calls
a
“green
Jim
Crow”
—
where
working-class
minorities
face
increasing
headwinds
in
terms
of
jobs
and
housing.
“Class
and
economics
now
play
a
greater
role
in
American
politics
than
skin
colour
or
national
origin.”
Read
the
rest
of
this
piece
at
Unherd.
Joel
Kotkin
is
the
author
of
The
Coming
of
Neo-Feudalism:
A
Warning
to
the
Global
Middle
Class.
He
is
the
Roger
Hobbs
Presidential
Fellow
in
Urban
Futures
at
Chapman
University
and
and
directs
the
Center
for
Demographics
and
Policy
there.
He
is
Senior
Research
Fellow
at
the
Civitas
Institute
at
the
University
of
Texas
in
Austin.
Learn
more
at
joelkotkin.com
and
follow
him
on
Twitter
@joelkotkin.
Photo:
Jagz
Mario,
under
CC
2.0
License.
Go to Source
Author: Joel Kotkin
