In reporting for her new book, Second Class: How the Elites Betrayed America’s Working Men and Women, Newsweek’s Batya Ungar-Sargon traveled the country seeking out and talking with members of America’s working class who are fighting to survive. They were cleaning ladies and health aides, truck drivers and Amazon delivery people, fast food workers, builders and others — so called “voters who shower after work.”
What she concluded was what this week’s election may have borne out: That working class voters, long a guaranteed voting bloc for Democrats, feel left behind. That no one in power is speaking to or for them. That what they want is not all that complicated: Respect and a way to achieve the American dream through hard work.
“There is a divide in America,” Ungar-Sargon said at the National Conservatism Conference in July. “It’s not between left and right. It’s between the polarized elites and an incredibly, unified working class.”
How did that play out in the November election? Ungar-Sargon will share what she’s learned through her extensive reporting among working class Americans at The Citizen’s 7th annual Ideas We Should Steal Festival presented by Comcast NBCUniversal, on November 15, in Center City.
Ungar-Sargon will be joined by former PA Congressman and Undersecretary of the Army Patrick Murphy, a Democrat who grew up in Northeast Philly the son of a police officer and a legal secretary. Murphy himself worked as a Vet Stadium security guard in high school, and then went on after law school to serve in the Army, with deployments to both Bosnia and Afghanistan. He was a champion of America’s workers when in Congress.
See Ungar-Sargon talk about her research below, and then secure your spot for the Festival.
