Brian Easton has a look at a major US study that suggests Americans are not paying enough attention to the working class

This is a re-post of an article originally published on pundit.co.nz. It is here with permission.

This column is about the white working class. In the US 2024 elections they mainly voted for Donald Trump. Had they voted with the white middle class, Trump would have lost the election with only 42 percent of voters instead of the 50 percent he actually won. (Because so many potential voters he only won 32 percent of all, Kamala Harris 31 percent and non-voter 67 percent.) The equivalent class may also be important in many other Western democracies including New Zealand.

I am going to analyse it by reporting on a remarkable study, Deaths of Disease, by two Princeton University economists, Anne Case and her husband Angus Deaton. (Deaton was the 2015 Nobel laureate in economics ‘for his analysis of consumption, poverty, and welfare’; his 2023 Economics in America: An Immigrant Economist Explores the Land of Inequality deserves a review in its own right.)

The study started off as a curiosity question when the two wondered why the suicide rate in the Montana county in which they were holidaying in 2014 was four times that of the New Jersey county which was their main home. Fortunately, they could pursue their question without having to get funding so they published their conclusions just a year later; had they gone through New Zealand’s clumsy research-funding system they would have still been waiting for permission.

Curiosity research often gets the researcher nowhere, but it can open up unexpected insights. Thus it was with this question.

Earlier I described the study in class terms. Official death certificates don’t record an individual’s social class. But American ones record their educational attainment. Case and Deaton divide the white non-Hispanics into those with a four-year college degree and those without, which is a not unreasonable proxy for class, and focus on the mid-life 45-to-54-year-olds. The white non-Hispanic working class made up about 38 percent of US voters, more than the corresponding middle class with college degrees (33 percent) or the others (29 percent) – mainly Blacks and Hispanics.

Initially the researchers’ concern was suicide but they broadened their study to include deaths from drug overdoses and suicides – the ‘deaths of despair’ – and pursued many other health and lifestyle measures to understand what was going on. Their repeated finding is that while the indicators for the White working class are worse than those for the White middle class, as one might expect, the working class indicators are deteriorating over time, whereas the middle class ones are stable or improving. This is particularly true for the deaths of despair, which almost trebled between 1995 and 2018 for the White working class but were stable for its middle class.

The effect is so strong that since 2000 US White non-Hispanic men and women (of both classes) in mid-life have experienced continual increases in mortality and morbidity, while US Blacks and US Hispanics, as well as all subgroups of populations in other affluent countries, show the opposite trend.

The researchers consider why. It turns out that White working class (age-adjusted) life satisfaction is also falling while that of the corresponding middle class is stable. (That for Blacks is rising – although as a rule the Black indicators are worse in level terms). So are their median earnings while those for the white non-Hispanic middle class are rising.

After a careful review of the available evidence, Case and Deaton do not attribute the deaths of despair to poverty, falling real incomes or increasing inequality. (This is especially surprising given Deaton’s expertise in poverty as the Nobel citation indicates; Case’s is in health and labour economics. I should not be surprised if Deaton is sceptical about those who cite rising inequality as the cause of everything going wrong but don’t understand the measure and provide no causal evidence.) They cite other groups, such as US Blacks, whose economic and health indicators are worse than for whites and yet they are showing gains.

Instead Case and Deaton argue that the ultimate cause is people’s sense that life is meaningless, unsatisfying or not fulfilling, and it lacks the basic economic security that makes these higher order feelings more likely. In particular, they suggest that working conditions for these people have deteriorated, citing technological change, globalisation and weakening unions.

I was reminded of a study of the determinants of why ex-prisoners lapsed back into crime. It was not only those that were unemployed but also those who had poor-quality jobs. Those with good-quality jobs with rich networks of workmates were much less likely to return to crime.

The research was first reported before Trump was on the serious political horizon and did not have had him or political voting particularly in mind. Yet, as the opening paragraph points out, it sheds some light on Trump’s support. It is an odd reversal that today the Democrats support clusters around the well-off and the Republicans seem to represent the working class (although the cautious might distinguish Trump from traditional Republicans).

It seems likely that the White non-Hispanic working class are consciously rejecting the Democrats, perhaps partly because the party is still dominant for other racial groups but also because the Democrats are so dominated by middle-class values and perceptions that they are not addressing the concerns of the depressed working class.

I am struck by how many diagnoses of the Democrats’s failure are supercilious about the working class – along the lines that the poor fools are persuaded by populism. Well yes, but the populist politicians are seemingly addressing their concerns, while the supercilious ignore them. That is not to say that the populist policies will effectively meet working class needs if they are applied. But at least it thinks it is being listened to.

Trump’s assault on the independence of US universities is an example. In my view the attack is politically motivated, aiming to undermine liberal democracy (also with long-term repercussions on US economic growth). But the white working class might well ask ‘what has Harvard ever done for me other than ignore my needs?’ (That is not quite true, but there is the ring of truth.)

Dos this American situation apply elsewhere? It is generally accepted that there is rising populism throughout the world and one can at least conjecture its success arises from its seeming to address the concerns of the marginalised, which are neglected by the elite. If you look at its account of democracy – which might be judged self-centred and self-satisfied – one might conclude that a benevolent dictator is attractive (although it is rare for dictators to remain benevolent – Pope Francis may be the exception). I was struck that many Brexit voters seemed to be saying ‘up you’ to the British elite, especially the London-based financial sector.

Does the situation apply to Aotearoa New Zealand? Talking about social class here is a bit like talking about sex in Victorian times. One doesn’t, even though it is a powerful driver of life. I am struck, for instance, how discussions on Māori socioeconomic status are really about a Māori working class, ignoring that there is a thriving Māori middle class, and that much of the analysis applies to the non-Māori working class. (This is not to ignore that there are particular Māori issues, just as the US has extraordinary challenges from its past – and consequently current – treatment of its First Peoples and Blacks.)

I suspect the politics of the working class is muted in New Zealand by MMP, with a number of parties vying for the populist vote. I leave you to judge to what extent the Labour Party is neglecting the working class but note that it still seems more dependent upon unions than the US Democrats. I cannot help wondering whether the success of gangs is because they give some meaning, life satisfaction and fulfilment to their members. I observe that international success, such as in sport, gives even the marginal a temporary meaning to their lives.

Case and Deaton think that there are no quick fixes to the sad state of the White working class. It is the result of decades of disadvantages; solving it will require patience and perseverance. True here (true for Māori). But we can do better, by paying attention to their needs.

There is an irony in Trump’s strategy. He pays attention to the working class in the way that the Democrats do not. And he thinks he is addressing their concerns by promising jobs in a manufacturing sector extended by border protection (although even if he succeeds, he overlooks that the majority of jobs and job growth in a modern affluent economy are in the service sector). Presumably, his hope – as foreshadowed by Orban in Hungary – is to use his successes to embed a hegemonic dictatorship.

Populism is a shallow philosophy but it works – temporarily anyway – at the ballot box. We threaten the viability of liberal democracy if we do not respond more creatively than currently.

*Brian Easton, an independent scholar, is an economist, social statistician, public policy analyst and historian. He was the Listener economic columnist from 1978 to 2014. This is a re-post of an article originally published on pundit.co.nz. It is here with permission.