Maybe the Working Class Isn’t What You Think

The oligarchs made Trump. The rest of us just live with it.

Photo by Andrew Leu on Unsplash

People like to make lazy assumptions about the working class. We are a more politically and culturally diverse class than outsiders assume.

Somebody who doesn’t know a thing about me told me I should try to find common ground with Trumpers. I should try to understand them.

He didn’t know who he was talking to, clearly.

I already know the working class, because I’m part of it. I know plenty of MAGA voters, because I am surrounded by them. And no, those two groups aren’t always the same people.

What if it’s the billionaires, not the baristas?

There are a lot of us who are working class, rural or small-town people living in red areas who see Trump for exactly what he is and despise him. On the other hand, some of the richest and most powerful people in the world — including the richest man in the world — bankrolled his rise and legitimized him with their platforms.

Had all the most influential financial and political leaders done what they should have and denounced him, he would not be president today.

A lot of the Big Tech billionaires pretended to lean left until they saw an opportunity to pay even fewer taxes, at which point they immediately leaned the other way. Oligarchs can do whatever they want regardless of what party is in power.

The public good is irrelevant to the ultra-wealthy. If an oligarch gets his mistress pregnant, what does he care about local abortion laws? He’ll fly her wherever. What do those people care about the quality of public schools? Their children will never darken the door of one.

Blame the robber barons, not the working class stiffs

Where are the think pieces exploring why many of the richest of the rich threw their support behind Trump? Why do we pretend the working class was powerful enough to tip the election? Do we even stop to think about who was spending a fortune to influence the working class and everyone else?

The working class and the billionaires do not have the same interests and should not be on the same side. What does it mean that they appear to be? It shows that the billionaires were voting for their own financial best interest and they had enough money and influence to sway others — including many working class people — to vote against their own interests.

On Inauguration Day, I did not see any nurses or welders or bus drivers up on stage. I did see META CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and the world’s richest troll, Elon Musk. Also around were Apple CEO Tim Cook and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew.

Aside from money, look at the propaganda power each of them wield: They all control some aspect of Big Data.

I resent anybody assuming either of two things about me: First, that I might be a Trumper. I would rather be mistaken for a thief than a Trumper. Second, that I might be some kind of elite based on my politics or my particular taste in cultural matters or anything else. It stings when someone assumes I am operating from a middle- or upper-class perspective, and it happens all the time. I have not been allowed in that club, and thus enjoy no perks of membership.

I grew up in a trailer

It was a used one. Not even a double-wide.

When I was in junior high, we moved into a small, modest house my parents built with their own hands, about a block away from where our trailer had been. Until I went off to a (state) school, I lived in the same town of 200 surrounded by corn and bean fields. I wore a lot of hand-me-downs and homemade clothing in my younger years. I ate a lot of fried bologna.

My college degree was not a ticket to affluence. My forays into the middle class have always been short-lived. Part of that is my major, journalism. I did not expect to ever make a lot of money, and I was not wrong about that. Sure, I’d like to have more money, but there are many things I will not do just to get it.

On the other hand, years of working in newspapers did teach me quite a bit about news and truth and power and people. I know bullshit when I see it, which makes it hard for me to understand how readily others fall for it. But perception and insight don’t necessarily come from a place of wealth, power, education or intelligence. One good way to develop it is to spend your life writing, reading and editing news stories.

I am not as unusual as some people apparently think. Lots of working class and lower-income people see exactly what’s going on.

There’s only a shaky correlation between money, merit and intelligence

Elon Musk’s biographer estimates the richest man in the world has an IQ of between 100-110 — so average or just above average.

People end up in various impressive, average and terrible places in life for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes it’s intelligence and merit that shape our paths. Other times, it’s pure luck or the family you were born into.

The barista making your overpriced coffee may well have more education than you do. That’s a cliche, but the same thing is true of the guy frying your burger at McDonald’s. Or mowing your lawn.

I live in a working-class, small-town community, feeling very oppressed indeed, but I’m not stupid. I have recognized Trump as the blundering buffoon he is since sometime in the 1980s and I feel a fair bit of contempt for those who can’t see it.

I still feel a wave of astonishment roll over me each time I see him speak. This guy? This guy is president? Really? What’s wrong with people?

Approximately a thousand years ago, in 2023, New York Times columnist David Brooks actually asked What if We’re the Bad Guys Here? and then he proceeded to talk about how wealthy elites of his class have oppressed the poor and working class. That part is true enough: They have.

But then he mused that the working class prefers a rich and corrupt guy just because he regularly attacks the professional managerial class. He didn’t speculate about the motive of many of the country’s most prominent oligarchs who jumped in bed with Trump.

Stop pretending the working class is the problem. If you want to understand what’s happening, start with the men running the propaganda machines.

Don’t miss my current special series, Poverty and Privilege, which comes out every Saturday.

Part 1, Unlikely Allies in an Unequal America

Part 2, The Country Club Lunch

Part 3, One Family’s Fall From the Middle Class

Part 4, Billable Hours Don’t Pause for Birth

About Michelle Teheux

I’m a writer in central Illinois. If you like my work, subscribe to me here and on Medium. I also have a new Substack aimed at authors who want to self-publish books, called The Indie Author. My most recent book is Strapped: Fighting for the soul of the American working class. My most recent novel is The Trailer Park Rules. If you prefer to give a one-time tip, I accept Ko-fi.

All wealthy families are alike; each poor family is poor in its own way.
— Leo Tolstoy, if he had written about a trailer park

For residents of the Loire Mobile Home Park, surviving means understanding which rules to follow and which to break. Each has landed in the trailer park for wildly different reasons.

Jonesy is a failed journalist with one dream left. Angel is the kind of irresponsible single mother society just shakes its head about, and her daughter Maya is the kid everybody overlooks. Jimmy and Janiece Jackson wanted to be the first in their families to achieve the American dream, but all the positive attitude in the world can’t solve their predicament. Darren is a disabled man trying to enjoy his life despite a dark past. Kaitlin is a former stripper with a sugar daddy, while Shirley is an older lady who has come down in the world and lives in denial. Nancy runs the park like a tyrant but finds out when a larger corporation takes over that she’s not different from the residents.

When the new owners jack up the lot rent, the lives of everyone in the park shift dramatically and in some cases tragically.

Welcome to the Loire Mobile Home Park! Please observe all rules.

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