In the January 6th edition of The New York Times, Democratic political consultant James Carville, in his op-ed piece, "Why I Was Wrong About the 2024 Election", says the Democrats lost the presidency to Donald Trump because their messaging didn't stick to the meat-and-potatoes economic conditions of middle and lower income voters. Trump won, he claims, by putting "the economic anger of Americans front and center". But Carville, famous for his "It's the economy, stupid!" dictum, doesn't really go into what they're so "angry" about.
So why is it that, on the front page of that same January 6th New York Times, in a "News Analysis" article entitled "'Disaster'? No. Trump Inherits Nation in Pretty Good Shape", we are told that, under Biden, "jobs are up, wages are rising, the economy is growing, unemployment is as low as it was just before the Covid 19 pandemic, (and) the manufacturing sector has more jobs than under any president since Bush"?
Such are the prevailing "good news" metrics put out regularly by Democrats--all presumably framing Trump voters' "economic anger" as what, manipulated delusion?
Or maybe they're just not looking at the most pertinent economic metrics to explain voters' attitudes and behavior.
In 2022, the Pew Research Center reported that since 1971, the number of U.S. adults in middle-class households fell from 61% down to 50%. The number in lower-income households rose from 25% to 29%, and the number in upper-income households rose from 14% to 21%.
During the same 50-year period, the total aggregate U.S. household income held by the middle class fell from 62% to 42%, the aggregate income of the significantly enlarged number of lower-class Americans dropped from 10% to 8%. And the aggregate upper-class household income rose from 29% to 50%.
In other words, despite recent metrics that might suggest some positive things are happening "now", for the past 50 years, American families have been facing an increasingly uphill battle to prosper in the land of opportunity, while aggregate U.S. wealth (reflected primarily within its upper-stratum share) has only increased.
So why are Trump's voters "angry"? Maybe it's because the legislative agenda of our government has sided with corporate over public interests ever since conservative Reaganomics became the driving force in American politics. Maybe American workers really do feel up against it and are willing to rage, however foolishly and at the peril of democratic institutions, at whatever propped-up scapegoats they are provided with by demagogic politicians who, like the Wizard of Oz, keep the systemically exploitive and class-driven priorities of government behind the curtain.
So when James Carville says, once again, that Democrats must focus more exclusively on "the economy," we must also insist on what the right metrics are that require attention and fixing, so as to avoid being "stupid" again.
