I have been thinking about this question and have come to some conclusions as well as some observations and opinions.
We have talked about “voting against their interests”. This implies two things. The first is that people are stupid as to what their interests are and we have to tell them in order to bring them into the light. This is false. People have multiple interests and those interests are arranged via belief systems in their minds, both consciously and subconsciously. The second is that what we deem as most important in terms of interests may or may not be important to others.
We have seen in the last election that “the economy” is far too complex a system to make simplistic generalizations such as “why can’t people see that the economy is good?”. The complexity of the interactions makes statements like this null and void. The reality is, as noted by others, that economic measures do not measure the impacts and shifts on a personal level. This particularly applies to the personal level of those who are not wealthy. Wealth is insulated from the vagaries of movements within the economy. The left failed and has failed to note this for the last 60+ years. Since the oil shock of the ‘70’s and the rise of Reagan agitprop about the economy has papered over the shifts caused by globalization, financialization and technology/automation. These three forces much more than anything else have impacted labor on a scale never seen before. While creative destruction in the past eliminated certain jobs/tasks performed by human labor the technologies that emerged created far larger opportunities for employment. This is no longer the case.
Beyond these comments we can note that racism, misogyny and homo-, transphobia also played a large role. This can be seen by shifts that seem to be in opposition in terms of voting. Large percentages of Latino and Black males voted for Trump due, imo, do the unwillingness to accept either a woman holding the office of president and/or deity prohibitions regarding sex. That DEI is supposed to help advance the economic fortunes of those same voters was deemed far less important.
MAGA is, imo, a smokescreen and political economic plan to transfer large amounts of wealth upward by using emotional stimuli that appeals to various groups in various ways. It appeals to White men because DEI will be eliminated. It appeals to some minority males because they are cis-gender. It appeals to some males because women should not hold positions of authority. In other words it makes excellent use of “the other” depending upon the audience. Trump himself is incapable of creating a deeply thought out philosophy on such a scale. This is evidenced by his defeat in 2020. Imo, enough political economy philosophers saw their opportunity to cause a tectonic shift in American society and knew that Trump would be useful for this. They also knew that the Republican Party would happily go along with the concepts. In point of opinion, it would behoove us to track the money as well as the contacts between Republican politicians and various well known and less well known think tanks and individuals/groups dedicated to imposing a two-tier political economy. Knowing your enemy is important.
While I have quasi-seriously talked about “Bird’s theorem” it is much more likely that stupidity and irrationality go hand in hand.
I welcome your comments.
We have talked about “voting against their interests”. This implies two things. The first is that people are stupid as to what their interests are and we have to tell them in order to bring them into the light. This is false. People have multiple interests and those interests are arranged via belief systems in their minds, both consciously and subconsciously. The second is that what we deem as most important in terms of interests may or may not be important to others.
We have seen in the last election that “the economy” is far too complex a system to make simplistic generalizations such as “why can’t people see that the economy is good?”. The complexity of the interactions makes statements like this null and void. The reality is, as noted by others, that economic measures do not measure the impacts and shifts on a personal level. This particularly applies to the personal level of those who are not wealthy. Wealth is insulated from the vagaries of movements within the economy. The left failed and has failed to note this for the last 60+ years. Since the oil shock of the ‘70’s and the rise of Reagan agitprop about the economy has papered over the shifts caused by globalization, financialization and technology/automation. These three forces much more than anything else have impacted labor on a scale never seen before. While creative destruction in the past eliminated certain jobs/tasks performed by human labor the technologies that emerged created far larger opportunities for employment. This is no longer the case.
Beyond these comments we can note that racism, misogyny and homo-, transphobia also played a large role. This can be seen by shifts that seem to be in opposition in terms of voting. Large percentages of Latino and Black males voted for Trump due, imo, do the unwillingness to accept either a woman holding the office of president and/or deity prohibitions regarding sex. That DEI is supposed to help advance the economic fortunes of those same voters was deemed far less important.
MAGA is, imo, a smokescreen and political economic plan to transfer large amounts of wealth upward by using emotional stimuli that appeals to various groups in various ways. It appeals to White men because DEI will be eliminated. It appeals to some minority males because they are cis-gender. It appeals to some males because women should not hold positions of authority. In other words it makes excellent use of “the other” depending upon the audience. Trump himself is incapable of creating a deeply thought out philosophy on such a scale. This is evidenced by his defeat in 2020. Imo, enough political economy philosophers saw their opportunity to cause a tectonic shift in American society and knew that Trump would be useful for this. They also knew that the Republican Party would happily go along with the concepts. In point of opinion, it would behoove us to track the money as well as the contacts between Republican politicians and various well known and less well known think tanks and individuals/groups dedicated to imposing a two-tier political economy. Knowing your enemy is important.
While I have quasi-seriously talked about “Bird’s theorem” it is much more likely that stupidity and irrationality go hand in hand.
I welcome your comments.
