During the antebellum days, Progressive Plantation owners had one job: to keep their slaves producing, which meant to feed, clothe, and provide medical care to their slaves. In fact, blacks who became successful after the Civil War observed that their Progressive Masters didn't possess a single skill that would support them in the real world. Fast forward to 2020. Progressives and all free people, Americans in particular, are expected to work for an income which is paid by their employer. Out of that income, they are expected to feed, clothe, and provide medical care to support themselves and their families. Is it a surprise that Progressives are dissatisfied with their plight? Is it a surprise that Progressives think the deal they gave their slaves was better than the deal freedom gives them?
Perhaps we can just call all working class right wing voters the lumpenproletariat and leave it at that?
It's quite obvious at this point that if the left wants to thrive they need to seize the working class convincingly.
And to do that there needs to be an understanding of why they often vote against their interest. The OP had no content. I referred to Marxism deliberately to help it along. Perhaps a combination of Marxism and Chomsky's analysis into the impact of debt on compliance?
I think it's pretty simple really - the poor have a wide ranging set of values of which their personal economic status is only one. It's the same reason so many wealthy people vote for left wing parties, clearly against their direct economic interest. The nature of Corbyn's defeat is a good example of this.
Given your overall stance on things, I'm surprised that you didn't go for the "rational irrationality" use of cognitive dissonance by (if my memory hasn't failed me) Caplan. You chose a poor example through the anti-Corbynism mind you. That's easy to understand and it has nothing to do with worker non-economic preferences. First, we had a concerted media storm designed to engineer misinformation. Indeed, scholarly research has shown that the so-called liberal media (particularly the BBC and Guardian) were chief architects. This was made worse by changes in social media which hindered diffusion of independent sources (but also increased the effectiveness of Tory vid adverts, despite most being found to be full of fibs). Second, as shown by the leaked report, Labour exhibited extreme factionalism. The Labour Right actively worked against a Corbyn victory, including being part of ensuring a focus on anti-semitism. Third, the Red Wall was certainly focused on economic concerns. Years of austerity had decimated their communities. We had Labour backtracking on Brexit via Starmer and therefore the Labour Right. That was seen as a betrayal. And we had Bojo repeatedly saying 'we will get Brexit done', with that seen as an economic answer given nationalism had been unleashed. Indeed, analysis shows that many people- despite the economic forecasts- were convinced they would be made better off through Brexit.
