Last week’s cover of the Economist — a special report on the American economy — featured a rolled-up dollar bill taking off like a rocket ship into the skies. The headline: “The Envy of the World.” Yet the strongest economy in the world has not paid off for President Joe Biden, who had the second-worst third-year average approval rating of any modern president. Nor is it giving Kamala Harris a commanding lead in the polls. It is yet one more powerful signal that our politics are in the midst of a great upheaval, as economic issues give way to cultural ones.
The economic paradox is even more profound when you consider that the Biden administration’s policies have been specifically designed to benefit the working class, made up largely of men without a college degree — and they have disproportionately benefited this group. And yet Harris is on track to receive the lowest share of this group’s votes in decades, with a deficit 9 points worse than Biden’s in 2020, according to New York Times polls. Add to this consistent polling that shows that Black and Hispanic men are moving away from the Democratic Party in historic numbers. What is going on?
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