The Most Important Article You'll Read Today About The Democratic Party

The belief that those who receive government assistance are somehow "undeserving" and "getting a free ride" is not only a phenomenon of rural areas, but is borne out in surveys nationwide.

"The pattern is right in line with surveys, which show a decades-long decline in support for redistributive policies and an increase in conservatism in the electorate even as inequality worsens. There has been a particularly sharp drop in support for redistribution among older Americans, who perhaps see it as a threat to their own Social Security and Medicare. Meanwhile, researchers such as Kathryn Edin, of Johns Hopkins University, found a tendency by many Americans in the second lowest quintile of the income ladder -- the working or lower-middle class -- to dissociate themselves from those at the bottom, where many once resided. 'There's this virulent social distancing -- suddenly, you're a worker and anyone who is not a worker is a bad person,' said Professor Edin. 'They're playing to the middle fifth and saying, 'I'm not those people.'"

The unfortunate human tendency to think yourself as better than your "undeserving" neighbor is what drives these people, even as their own lives are diminished by the very policies they vote to impose on others. To call this a vicious circle would be an understatement. Republican politicians thrive on and exploit these very real resentments, which are not by any means limited to "red" states. That's how people like Paul Le Page can be elected governor on an anti-welfare platform in relatively "liberal" states like Maine, where reliance on social programs, particular in rural areas, has increased. Meanwhile, those at the top of the economic ladder become more and more aggressive in securing all of the wealth for themselves, while the poor are played off against one another. Democrats can call it out for the ugliness that it surely is, but it is a reality seized upon in every Republican pronouncement from immigration to taxes. If you can get people to think they're somehow being taken advantage of by an undeserving "other" (especially if that "other" is a different color than they are), you can motivate them to vote any way you want.

There are no easy answers for Democrats to deal with and change these attitudes. The most obvious solution -- getting people to actually vote -- has become more difficult, particularly with the decline of unions, Democrats' traditional mechanism for mobilizing voters. There is also an obvious and intractable racial component driving this "politics of envy" that MacGillis, somewhat surprisingly, never addresses. He might also have mentioned that the tendency of the national party apparatus to discount and effectively cede these rural voters doesn't help matters, but instead exacerbates the problem. People aren't going to respond enthusiastically to a party that apparently doesn't even want to acknowledge their existence.

MacGillis also suggests that the resentment people feel towards others they consider "dependent" can be addressed head-on if the Democratic Party decides to make the effort:

"One way to do this is to make sure the programs are as tightly administered as possible. Instances of fraud and abuse are far rarer than welfare opponents would have one believe, but it only takes a few glaring instances to create a lasting impression. Ms. Edin, the Hopkins researcher, suggests going further and making it easier for those collecting disability to do part-time work over the table, not just to make them seem less shiftless in the eyes of their neighbors, but to reduce the recipients' own sense of social isolation."

Ultimately, however, the answer lies in investing the people who live in these areas with an economic future:

"The best way to reduce resentment, though, would be to bring about true economic growth in the areas where the use of government benefits is on the rise, the sort of improvement that is now belatedly being discussed for coal country, including on the presidential campaign trail. If fewer people need the safety net to get by, the stigma will fade, and low-income citizens will be more likely to re-engage in their communities -- not least by turning out to vote.

Note: All links in quoted segments are MacGillis's.