Politicians love to talk about the middle class. Tax cuts for the middle class. Middle class values. How every Canadian is middle class.

But maybe working class Canadians are the new political force.

According to polling research, working class Canadians are a rapidly growing demographic.

Back in 2002, 23% of Canadians considered themselves working class, according to EKOS Research.

In just over ten years, that’s grown dramatically.

By 2014, 31% of Canadians called themselves working class.

Meanwhile, the proportion of Canadians who consider themselves middle class plummeted – from 67% down to 47%.

Economists will endlessly debate the definition of working and middle class Canadians.

But Canadians themselves are pretty clear.

About 70% agree the most important markers of middle class membership are a secure job, financial stability and the ability to retire in financial security.

Things most working class Canadians don’t have.

And there’s a lot of evidence that what’s driving working class expansion is the economic insecurity of workers in their 20s, 30s and 40s.

Almost a third of today’s workers under 30 are in temporary jobs, according to recent research by the Canadian Labour Congress.

Over 230,000 want a full-time job but are stuck working part-time.

And 300,000 workers – in Ontario alone – are unpaid interns.

Unemployment remains high.

Economic insecurity means Canadians between 25 and 45 are likely to believe their income will be lower than their parents’ – by a margin of 44% to 32%, says EKOS. Canadians over 45 believe the opposite about themselves.

Certainly it’s true the rules of work have changed.

The manufacturing and resource workers of the previous generation had more permanent employment, full time jobs and regular shifts.

And – no coincidence – they were more likely to have a union contract.

Even non-union companies frequently paid union rates and benefits.

But in the 1980s and 90s, the proportion of Canadian workers with a union contract fell dramatically – from 38% to 30%.

The pendulum has been swinging away from union contracts and towards insecure work.

But are younger, working class Canadians a new force pushing the pendulum back?

Half of non-union workers under 35 now say they’d vote for a union if they had the chance, according to a 2015 Vector Research survey.

And over 70% of younger workers who currently have a union contract say they’d vote to continue it.

Those rates are rising generally and are higher than for older workers.

It seems to be having an impact.

After the rapid de-unionization of the 1980s and 1990s, the proportion of workers with a union contact stabilized, then started an up-tick in recent years, according to Statistics Canada. That growth has been led by workers in the service sector.

Canadians working for H&M, Future Shop and Holiday Inn now have a union contract.

The high-profile effort in the United States for a union contract at Vice, the online media company, spilled over to Canada.

Today, more Canadian union members are in service jobs than goods-producing jobs – a reversal from a generation ago.

And while union membership for older workers continues to fall, Statistics Canada data show rates for workers under 45 are mostly increasing.

Young working class Canadians face other challenges. Rising tuition and crippling student debt, expensive child care that limits career choices and – of course – unemployment.

These are serious challenges that can’t be solved by collective bargaining. Or by another selfie, tax cut or trade deal.

If younger, working class Canadians are going to up-shift from an emerging force to real political power, they need a coherent vision reflecting their needs.

That’s always been the job of the labour movement and NDP.

It’s Labour Day on Monday. Step forward and give it.