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Democrats 36,000, Part 2Whatever happened to working-class whites?

By Timothy Noah
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2002, at 6:46 PM ET
Book cover

We can all agree that the Emerging Democratic Majority (EDM) predicted in the book of that same name by John Judis and Ruy Teixeira failed to show its face on Nov. 5. (For the details, see Chatterbox's previous item, "Democrats 36,000.") Not to worry, say Judis and Teixeira; it'll be here by decade's end. Chatterbox finds many of their arguments persuasive, but they fudge unforgivably on one important constituency: white working-class males. It's a four-decade-old puzzle, and Judis and Teixeira haven't solved it.

Chatterbox's favorite conceit in The Emerging Democratic Majority is what Judis and Teixeira wittily dub "George McGovern's Revenge." McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign famously shattered the New Deal coalition that kept the White House in Democratic hands for most of the previous 40 years. (It drove away the white working-class males!) But Judis and Teixeira argue that McGovern also laid the foundation for a "progressive centrist" Democratic coalition of the future: working women, minorities, highly skilled professionals, people who live in university communities that have now evolved into new-economy "ideopolises." (For a summary, see Judis' article, "How George McGovern Won Election 2000 for the Dems" in the Dec. 4, 2000 New Republic.)

This McGovernite coalition was too negligible to prevent a Nixon landslide in 1972. Since then, though, its components have either grown or grown more Democratic, and together they now constitute a sort of larval EDM. Minorities, for instance, have grown from 10 percent of the electorate to 19 percent. Highly skilled professionals (a census grouping that includes architects, engineers, scientists, computer analysts, lawyers, physicians, registered nurses, teachers, social workers, therapists, designers, interior decorators, graphic artists, and actors) have both grown (they're now roughly 21 percent of the electorate) and grown more Democratic. They're more numerous because of the postindustrial economy. They're more Democratic, Judis and Teixeira argue, because, having marinated for years in academic and quasi-academic environments, they care more about things like creativity and spirituality than they do about market imperatives. (A white working-class male might put it differently: Because they're the big winners in the knowledge-based economy, highly skilled professionals can afford not to "care about" money.) Judis and Teixeira further point out that the economic interests of some highly skilled professionals are in conflict with the market. Doctors are the best example; during the past two decades they've been at war with the insurance companies that pay them.

While the McGovern coalition has ballooned, Judis and Teixeira argue, an important slice of the Reagan coalition—evangelical Christians—has leveled off or even started to shrink. White evangelical Christians tilted heavily toward Bush in the 2000 presidential contest, but they represented the same proportion of the electorate (around 25 percent) in 2000 as they did in 1992. Observant white Catholics, who in recent years have favored Republicans, represent a shrinking proportion of the electorate; 17 percent in 1960, the year John Kennedy was elected, they now are down to 6 percent. At the same time, the godless hordes, a reliable (if seldom acknowledged) Democratic constituency, are proliferating. Judis and Teixeira cite a finding by the National Opinion Research Center that those who never or rarely attend church grew to 30 percent in 1998, up from 18 percent in 1972. These church-avoiders number twice as many as those who identify themselves with the religious right. Chatterbox is proud to call himself one of them.

The main pro-Republican theory competing with EDM is the idea that the exurban Republican constituency—collectively dubbed "Patio Man" by David Brooks—is growing like crazy. Yes, Judis and Teixeira concede, these exurban cities are heavily Republican, and yes, they're growing faster than anyplace else in the United States. But they're growing from a teeny-tiny base. Colorado's Elbert County, the country's third-fastest-growing county, doubled its population during the 1990s—but that was merely from 10,000 to 20,000. What's important, Judis and Teixeira note, is not what's happening in these pipsqueak counties. What's important is what's happening in the 50 most populous counties. Gore won these, 54-42 percent, in 2000.

So far, so good. But what about the white working-class males?

Judis and Teixeira recount the sad story. Through the early 1960s, the Democrats, party of the working man, had a lock on the working man. But as Democrats started to support civil rights and oppose the Vietnam War, the white working class started voting for Republican presidential candidates. This realignment was reversed, somewhat, by Bill Clinton, who in 1992 won a 39 percent plurality of white working-class votes. It was Clinton's special genius to convey to African-Americans that he was America's "first black president" while simultaneously conveying to the white working class that he was not a captive of the African-American (i.e., liberal) political agenda. (He also got some help from Ross Perot, who drew white working-class votes away from George H.W. Bush.) There was some slippage in 2000, partly because Gore was a less gifted politician than Clinton, and partly because the main issue that had drawn the white working class to Democrats—"the economy, stupid"—had been mooted by the boom, allowing non-economic issues like gun control and affirmative action to come to the fore. But, Judis and Teixeira write,

the economic slowdown that began soon after George W. Bush took office is likely to lead many of these voters to pay renewed attention to economic issues, especially as their focus shifts back from the war on terror to domestic concerns. This should benefit Democrats for years to come [italics Chatterbox's].

There is zero evidence that the economy will continue to falter "for years to come." And it's insane for Democrats to root for such an outcome. Yes, it is possible that some sort of deflationary nightmare lies around the corner, but it's at least equally possible that it does not. Can't Judis and Teixeira cite anything else that will lure the white working class back to the Democrats? (Teixeira, after all, co-authored an entire book about the white working class and why it still matters.) Er, no. Then how can they claim it for the EDM?

They can't. Instead, they suggest that there will be fewer of these folks in the future, as more jobs shift from manufacturing to the new economy and as the working class becomes more racially diverse. But Judis and Teixeira can't have it both ways. If the white working class dwindles away, it won't help create an EDM. And if it doesn't dwindle away, it will need a reason to vote Democratic.

Chatterbox has no projections to offer (though he'd guess that the big decline in the nation's manufacturing sector has already occurred). But he does fear for the future of a Democratic Party whose attractions are evident only if you're on the dole or have three advanced degrees. If the Democrats were to cease even aspiring to be the party of the working man, it wouldn't seem to have much point.

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Remarks From The Fray:

On Judis and Teixeira and the working class:

Chatterbox wrote:

There is zero evidence that the economy will continue to falter "for years to come." And it's insane for Democrats to root for such an outcome.

There is even less evidence for the proposition that Judis and Teixeira were saying that the economy would falter for years to come. The Judis and Teixeira quote used by Chatterbox states that the present economic slowdown should keep voters focused on economic issues in the next election assuming that foreign policy does not intrude, that a focus on economic issues would benefit Democrats, and that such an election would bring working class voters into the Democratic coalition. These are arguable points, but they are better arguments than Chatterbox's deliberate misreading of Judis & Teixeira.

-- Meph

(To reply, click here.)


if I recall, their argument that in the advanced metropolitan "ideopolises", the white working class adopts the social and cultural values closer to the professionals they live with. They cite the Bay Area, Seattle,etc. where not only do professionals vote Democratic, so do working class whites. And they assert that as ideopolises continue to grow across the country, the white working class in those regions will vote more Democratic.

-- Roublen

(To reply, click here.)

On Chatterbox's proposed solution:

Great -- all the Democrats need to do to win the next election is to pander to a bunch of homophobes, racists, and religious zealots. Or, more to the point, pretend to pander to them like Clinton did so we can get on with the business of running the economy reasonably well and maintaining domestic order -- because white working-class men are not capable of seeing beyond their prejudices to their real interests.

Is it possible to be too cynical? Or is this realism? It feels very dark.

-- Kimmitt

(To reply, click here.)


On the working class more generally:

The "working class" today are the folks who feature in Barbara Ehrenreich's nickel and dimed,, the 30% or so of the country that finds itself working cruddy, non-unionized jobs that require no skills, offer no benefits, and provide absolutely no realistic hope of future advancement. These people tend to belong to ethnic and racial minorities, so they get rolled into the "minority" Democratic constituencies. This prevents them from being counted as part of the "shitty job" constituency, and thereby obscures (but underscores, if you're looking for it) a basic truth.

This truth, of course, is that:

NOBODY'S GOING TO HELP THE WORKING CLASS.

-- Thrasymachus

(To reply, click here.)

The concept of "class" implies some degree of consciousness of common interest, or at least the potential for such consciousness. That's what's missing from the "nickle and dimed" population. [Disclaimer: I haven't read Ehrenreich's book, only a couple of reviews of it.]

They are not highly defined by region, by ethnicity (they comprise several different minorities), by trades (as was the "working class" in both Marxist and unionist senses), or even by urban/rural residence. They are also typically relatively mobile as to employment; unlike the proletariat of another time, they change jobs relatively frequently. As a result, nobody gets a political fix on them, other than to assume they're Democrats. It isn't obvious, either, how to help such people. Unionization scarcely seems the answer, for a host of reasons. And many of this population themselves buy into the Milton Friedman argument that whatever keeps their often-small-business employers in business is good for them, too--i.e., low minimum wage, low taxes, few regulations.

I'm not arguing against the desirability of addressing their issues, simply trying to be realistic about what would be involved.


-- Quesnay

(To reply, click here.)


The definition of the working class is very simple -- it's the people who sell their labor power (physical or mental), as opposed to those who own the workplaces. There is a middle ground -- managers above a certain level, professionals (whose skills are of a nature sufficiently rare that they can organize to maximize their wages), and small businesses. Everybody else is working class.

I once made this argument to my brother, who was a tech writer for a large corporation with considerable computer skills as well, and he angrily denied that he, with a doctorate, could be considered working class. A year later he turned 50 and his daughter went to college and began to draw on the corporation's college fund (a perk given to long-term employees -- my brother had been there 25 years), and the next thing he knew there was a reorganization and he was out on the street, without ever having received a bad performance review.

I know DOZENS of such stories of people who would HIT you if you said they were working class; who bridle at the idea that they're in any way similar to the Mexican kind flipping their luncheon burgers. But although their pay and working conditions differ, they are equally dispensable.

If you want to argue that the working class almost never seems to THINK it's a class, you won't get any argument from me. But we have just come out of an era -- the 1990s -- in which labor power was so scarce in this country that much of it had to be imported -- legally or illegally. Such times are rare, and this one is over. Ten years from now, some of those white collars are going to be flipping burgers, too, and what I said to my brother won't sound nearly as silly as it did a few years ago.

How will all of that play out? I have no idea. No government has ever been run by and for the working class, and the Soviet example is a cautionary tale about handing power over to intellectuals who use the right slogans to feather their own nests. When I was much younger, I was much more hopeful than I am now.

But regardless of what happens, the playing out of class politics will never end, because it's the way the world works. And the only serious question for any individual in this world is
"which side are you on?"

-- Slasher

(To reply, click here.)

(11/13)

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