As the close­ly con­test­ed pres­i­den­tial race enters the home stretch, both cam­paigns are try­ing to sway the few unde­cid­ed vot­ers and boost key, if uncer­tain, bases of sup­port: white retirees or work­ing class men for Mitt Rom­ney, women and bet­ter-edu­cat­ed vot­ers for Barack Obama.

The con­test may hinge on the suc­cess of such nar­row appeals, but, joust­ing aside, the core issues at stake in this elec­tion involve ques­tions of class. Dri­ven for decades by rich donors, big cor­po­ra­tions and ​ “ move­ment con­ser­v­a­tives” (like the Tea Partiers), the Repub­li­can Par­ty has increas­ing­ly com­mit­ted itself to an extreme anti-gov­ern­ment, raw cap­i­tal­ist ide­ol­o­gy. In reac­tion against Obama’s mod­er­ate lib­er­al­ism — a return to pre-Bush tax rates for the rich and mod­est reg­u­la­tions of an out-of-con­trol finan­cial sec­tor — Repub­li­cans want to con­sol­i­date the pow­er of rich indi­vid­u­als and cor­po­ra­tions while esca­lat­ing the redis­tri­b­u­tion of wealth from the 99 % to the 1 %.

All elec­tions revolve around class inter­ests, but some — like Franklin Roosevelt’s Depres­sion-era vic­to­ries — do so more than oth­ers. In con­trast, in the 1950 s and 1960 s, many big cor­po­ra­tions and the main­stream of the Repub­li­can Par­ty (but not Gold­wa­ter) grudg­ing­ly acqui­esced to the New Deal lega­cy, mak­ing the elec­tions less about class than about the Cold War, race and how much to expand the New Deal.

By the ear­ly 1970 s, cor­po­ra­tions — com­ple­ment­ed by rich right-wing ide­o­logues — began to orga­nize in a more class-con­scious way against the threat to their prof­its posed by unions and the move­ments of the ​ ’ 60 s. They built think tanks, lob­by­ing oper­a­tions and media orga­ni­za­tions to advance both short-term pol­i­cy goals and, in the long run, to polit­i­cal­ly ​ “ roll back the 20 th cen­tu­ry,” in the words of jour­nal­ist William Grei­der. The con­ser­v­a­tive move­ment focused on the Repub­li­cans, but cor­po­ra­tions and their PACs donat­ed as well to Democ­rats, buy­ing access and ulti­mate­ly influ­enc­ing policy.

1980 elec­tion marked a turn­ing point, with his overt anti-union actions (break­ing the air traf­fic con­trollers strike) and his dec­la­ra­tion that gov­ern­ment is the prob­lem, not the solu­tion. Since then, forces such as Amer­i­cans for Tax Reform, the Club for Growth and the Tea Par­ty have pushed Repub­li­can can­di­dates ever right­ward. The party’s goal became cut­ting tax­es and gov­ern­ment with­out any regard to fis­cal cau­tion. Between 2000 and 2008 , dur­ing what the Pew Research Cen­ter recent­ly described as Reagan’selec­tion marked a turn­ing point, with his overt anti-union actions (break­ing the air traf­fic con­trollers strike) and his dec­la­ra­tion that gov­ern­ment is the prob­lem, not the solu­tion. Since then, forces such as Amer­i­cans for Tax Reform, the Club for Growth and the Tea Par­ty have pushed Repub­li­can can­di­dates ever right­ward. The party’s goal became cut­ting tax­es and gov­ern­ment with­out any regard to fis­cal cau­tion. Betweenand, dur­ing what the Pew Research Cen­ter recent­ly described as ​ “ the lost decade of the mid­dle class,” the Repub­li­can agen­da favor­ing the rich reached its apex with George W. Bush’s dereg­u­la­tion and tax-slash­ing that led to slow job growth, record inequal­i­ty and finan­cial collapse.

Despite that fail­ure, Rom­ney sup­ports an inten­si­fi­ca­tion of the class war that Bush waged. Pro-Oba­ma Super PAC strate­gist Paul Begala described the vice-pres­i­den­tial choice of Paul Ryan, long a stri­dent advo­cate of cut­ting or pri­va­tiz­ing most fed­er­al social pro­grams, as ​ “ going nuclear” on class.

2008 , espe­cial­ly those in the finan­cial sec­tor, have shift­ed to Rom­ney. And they will get a return on their invest­ment should the Repub­li­cans enact their agen­da, which includes cut­ting income tax rates for indi­vid­u­als to 20 per­cent below Bush-era rates, and by reduc­ing or elim­i­nat­ing tax­es on cor­po­ra­tions, large inher­it­ed estates and invest­ments. Con­trary to his deficit hawk image, Rom­ney did not explain how he would ​ “ broad­en the tax base” to pay for a ​ “ pro­tect­ing” Social Secu­ri­ty. As it stands, one of four things would happen: Jane May­er reports in The New York­er that rich donors who heav­i­ly backed Oba­ma in, espe­cial­ly those in the finan­cial sec­tor, have shift­ed to Rom­ney. And they will get a return on their invest­ment should the Repub­li­cans enact their agen­da, which includes cut­ting income tax rates for indi­vid­u­als toper­cent below Bush-era rates, and by reduc­ing or elim­i­nat­ing tax­es on cor­po­ra­tions, large inher­it­ed estates and invest­ments. Con­trary to his deficit hawk image, Rom­ney did not explain how he wouldbroad­en the tax base” to pay for a pro­ject­ed rev­enue short­fall of $ 5 tril­lion to $ 7 tril­lion over a decade caused by these and oth­er pro­pos­als — which include spend­ing more on defense whilepro­tect­ing” Social Secu­ri­ty. As it stands, one of four things would happen:

Bud­get deficits would actu­al­ly increase.

Democrats have scored political points on Romney’s wealth in tax havens and Bain’s frequent destruction of American jobs, but they have so far failed to make class issues central to the election debate.

House­holds with incomes under $200,000 would pay sig­nif­i­cant­ly high­er taxes.

Gov­ern­ment would deeply slash invest­ment on such long-term needs as edu­ca­tion, research and infrastructure.

All of the above.

In short, Rom­ney and the Repub­li­cans would fun­da­men­tal­ly reshape gov­ern­ment to reduce, elim­i­nate or pri­va­tize (and crip­ple) most pro­grams that redis­trib­ute income, how­ev­er mod­est­ly, or pro­vide eco­nom­ic secu­ri­ty and oppor­tu­ni­ty to the 99 %. Oba­ma and the Democ­rats do not have a com­pa­ra­bly strong class-ori­ent­ed coun­ter­strat­e­gy to expand the role of gov­ern­ment for long-term growth, equal­i­ty, oppor­tu­ni­ty and secu­ri­ty. But Oba­ma will at least defend pub­lic pro­grams for social wel­fare, from eco­nom­ic secu­ri­ty to health­care (which he great­ly expand­ed). He also favors more pro­gres­sive tax­a­tion and sup­ports reg­u­la­tion of cor­po­ra­tions and the finan­cial ser­vices indus­try. He sticks by the argu­ment that pub­lic invest­ment is cen­tral to pri­vate busi­ness success.

58 to 32 mar­gin, reg­is­tered vot­ers see Rom­ney as favor­ing the rich over the mid­dle class. And reg­is­tered vot­ers resound­ing­ly reject Romney’s plan for turn­ing Medicare into a vouch­er program. Democ­rats have scored polit­i­cal points on Romney’s wealth in tax havens and Bain’s fre­quent destruc­tion of Amer­i­can jobs, but they have so far failed to make class issues cen­tral to the elec­tion debate. Rom­ney — who did not endear him­self with work­ers when he explained how much he likes to fire peo­ple — is vul­ner­a­ble on this issue. An August NBC/Wall Street Jour­nal poll found that Romney’s tax returns and Bain Capital’s past made reg­is­tered vot­ers view him more neg­a­tive­ly. Accord­ing to an ABC/Wash­ing­ton Post poll , by atomar­gin, reg­is­tered vot­ers see Rom­ney as favor­ing the rich over the mid­dle class. And reg­is­tered vot­ers resound­ing­ly reject Romney’s plan for turn­ing Medicare into a vouch­er program.

Yet sup­port for Oba­ma does not fol­low class lines. Over­whelm­ing­ly, African-Amer­i­cans and Lati­nos, who are dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly work­ing class, say they will vote for Oba­ma. But in the NBC poll, only 34 per­cent of white reg­is­tered vot­ers with­out a col­lege degree say they will vote for Oba­ma, which would be — if it holds — the low­est per­cent­age for that group of vot­ers for a Demo­c­ra­t­ic pres­i­den­tial can­di­date since George McGovern’s 1972 loss.