Why Democrats Are Losing Americans Without a College Degree--and How to Win Them Back [View all]
Why Democrats Are Losing Americans Without a College Degree—and How to Win Them Back
Voters intuitively know that the economy has not worked well for most of us for decades. Democrats must offer them a transformative vision, and stick to it for as long as it takes.
NEIL KRAUS and JON SHELTON
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-economy-election-working-class/
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What Democrats must do, instead, is to offer a big transformative vision, and stick to it for as long as it takes to actualize it. Offering such a vision is not as daunting as it sounds. Rather, the Democrats need to tap into their own history of changing the nation’s economic tapestry, through traditions like the New Deal and Great Society, which made them a majority party for decades, to improve the livelihoods of the people who do all the work.
Democrats must craft a vision of economic rights that tells a story of how we got here and what we need to do. It needs to be big and repeated over and over. We suggest, as Harvey Kaye and Alan Minsky have proposed, a modern version of FDR’s economic bill of rights, which includes the rights to housing, universal healthcare, a job with a living wage; and tuition-free public education.
Crucially, labor unions must be a central component of this vision, and organizing around economic security must be central. It isn’t difficult to understand. Organized labor is enjoying its highest support in over 50 years, as roughly 70 percent of Americans (including almost half of Republicans) approve of unions.
The villain in this story is corporate America. Democrats can side with corporate interests, or they can win elections. But they cannot do both. As a mill worker once wrote to FDR: “Mr. Roosevelt is the only man we ever had in the White House who understood my boss is a son-of-a-bitch.” Democrats must invoke the FDR ethos, and for God’s sake, no Democratic candidate should ever call themselves a “capitalist” ever again.
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Applegrove: not sure I agree with getting rid of the word capitalism. Maybe it could be replaced with 'mixed market economy'. Food for thought.
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