Class war could replace culture war

For most of the election season, from Iowa to Pennsylvania, the American media have focused relentlessly on the politics of race, culture and gender. Yet as we look down the next decade, these are likely to become less important issues as we enter a new era centered instead on issues related to globalization and its impact on upward mobility and economic growth.

This shift will test the adaptability of both parties and of baby-boom-dominated media more comfortable following the rhythms of identity and racial politics than focusing on economics. Elite journalists tend to come from the best schools and affluent families, and they have been shaped, either personally or through their schooling, by the cultural and racial obsessions of the 1960s. Unlike journalists and politicians who emerged from the Depression era, they tend to focus much less on a growing sense of economic drift that cuts across racial differences, cultural divides and generations.


The emerging new paradigm also reflects some good news. Those who were around in 1960 may be astounded to see a bracing presidential campaign waged between a mixed-race senator and a woman long identified with liberal social causes. And those who grew up during the Depression might also recognize the issues of class and social mobility that are now moving to the forefront.

Increasing numbers of Americans find it ever more problematic to maintain a “middle class” lifestyle. The current mortgage crisis, which has eroded the value of the most valuable asset of millions of Americans, only exacerbates these concerns. In such a situation, it’s hard to see how micro fractures among ethnic and gender identities will continue to be the defining issues of our politics as they were during the last half of the 20th century.

For example, suburbs — once derided for their homogeneity — have become laboratories for an increasingly hybridized society. Barely 5 percent minority in 1970, they are nearly 27 percent so today. Kids who grow up in these diverse suburbs and then go on to attend highly integrated colleges are showing a remarkable tendency to mix it up both culturally and personally.

These trends are being accelerated by the growing role of Asians and Latinos, who in the second generation intermarry at rates as high as one in three. Mixed-raced couples are no longer an oddity. Some multiracial Americans — Barack Obama, Tiger Woods and Mariah Carey come to mind — are among the country’s most celebrated figures.

In contrast, economic issues seem certain to become more important in the next decade. This is a matter for not only older Americans: As the large millennial generation ages, it could well face an increasingly difficult economic climate. In the past, a college education alone has been the sure ticket to upward mobility; in this century, the newest research shows that it no longer guarantees any such thing. Wages for recent college graduates, particularly males, have been dropping since 2000, even as less-educated workers, at least in some places, have done better.

This trend may well reflect the unintended consequences of technology and globalization, as well as changed demographics. The current high tide of college graduates, including many immigrants, has flooded the market precisely as new telecommunications technology has facilitated the shift of high-end work to distant locations. By some estimates, outsourcing to other countries accounted for as many as 40 percent of the 900,000 technology jobs lost in the first four years of this decade.

All this makes the prospect of a post-industrial “golden age” — a re-creation of the prosperity, if not the mores, of 1950s America — an increasingly distant prospect, even for relatively skilled Americans. Yet, sadly, this predicament has been only crudely addressed by the kind of boilerplate anti-NAFTA populism espoused first by Hillary Rodham Clinton and, more recently, by Obama.

What the country really needs is a strategy to expand middle-class opportunities and American competitiveness on the global stage. This approach would require a powerful new commitment to public works — such as fixing our often dilapidated roads, bridges, transit and ports — that would employ people at decent wages and make our companies more competitive against our global rivals.

Such an approach would be a departure from both parties’ overemphasis on boosting consumer spending and protecting asset speculators, in the form of individual investors or great financial institutions. Instead, we need incentives that encourage productive investment, practical skills training and competitive, export-oriented industries. These are precisely the policies that offer the best hope to assure the younger generation — both college-educated and not — a reasonable shot at a sustainable middle-class living standard.

Republicans, saddled with the unenviable legacy of George W. Bush, seem poorly positioned to adopt such a program. During the Republican primaries, only former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee seemed willing to grapple with deepening middle class angst. Like a traditional “progressive,” the Arkansan proposed a strong infrastructure investment agenda to provide good paying domestic jobs and enhance productivity. For his trouble, the self-appointed “movement” conservatives lambasted Huckabee as an apostate to those who adhere to the right-wing gospel on Wall Street.

Democrats, too, may have trouble effectively addressing the new paradigm. Despite their self-image as “the party of the people,” Democrats have been morphing into a more plutocratic party for almost a generation. Democrats routinely get more votes than the GOP among the fast growing population earning over six figures annually, and their financial advantage comes largely from the business elite, particularly on Wall Street, in Silicon Valley and in Hollywood.

Once the need to pander to the middle and working classes is over in November, Democrats may have too large a stake in the economic status quo to push a strong shift toward an agenda for broad-based economic growth. It’s difficult, for example, to foresee that either Clinton, whose own daughter works for a hedge fund, or Obama, who raised significant money early on from the industry’s young bulls and continues to score big among Silicon Valley’s venture community, would rein in tax breaks for this prized constituency.

Far easier to picture is that the party will adopt the platform of its powerful and well-funded green constituency; many of these enviros are also among the richest Americans and most generous Democratic donors. An Al Gore-style global warming jihad would be sure to gain support from the media, the academy, Silicon Valley, Hollywood and even Wall Street. But it might not be so popular among American manufacturers and workers forced to compete against largely unregulated competitors in Brazil, China, Russia and India.

Finally, and arguably with the most difficulty, Democrats will have to confront their constituency among public employee unions. A large-scale infrastructure and energy development program will require a significant rise in public resources. Yet many states and localities, given the pensions and benefits lavished on their workers, won’t have these resources unless they enact huge, politically problematic boosts in taxes and fees.

For our entire political class and the media as well, the shift in focus from culture and race to class and upward mobility seems certain to present an enormous challenge. Yet it should be done as quickly as possible if Americans want to secure a decent future for themselves and for the 100 million more of their fellow citizens who will inhabit this country over the coming decades.

Joel Kotkin is a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University and author of “The City: A Global History.” He is writing a book on the American future.