Contempt for America’s Middle

Recently, in between his attacks on critics of the present Israeli government, Ben Shapiro has been taking whacks at J D Vance. On an episode of the Joe Rogan podcast, Shapiro complained that Vance does not believe in “the free market.” It seems that our vice-president has taken note of the stagnant wages and job insecurity of American workers and believes that government has some responsibility to ameliorate these problems.

Although I take exception to some of  the ameliorative measures Vance proposes, particularly concerning the further empowerment of labor unions, I was far more struck by Shapiro’s persistent appeal to the “free market.” Apparently, this tired phrase still resonates among Boomer Republicans even though GOP pols have been invoking it for many decades, to the impassioned applause of their base but with little else to show for it.

I consider that term to be political rhetoric and nothing more.

Perhaps Ben has failed to notice that the United States has had a mixed economy, one that the urbanologist Joel Kotkin characterizes as “democratic capitalism,” since the last century. The state takes accumulated wealth from the private sector, and what it doesn’t spend on itself (which is a lot) is redistributed in the name of “fairness” (or just pleasing its voters). The government also heavily regulates commerce and determines the supply of money and credit. Kotkin and, presumably, the rest of the conservative establishment, which views “democratic capitalism” as one of its glories, have no problem with accepting such a mixed economy, although such an arrangement also affects markets and, according to Austrian economists, gravely distorts them.

 Shapiro may not want to address the issues Vance raises, which may be why he identifies them with the policies of California’s Governor Gavin Newsom, whom we’re supposed to boo. But in fact, the present left does not care about workers at all—particularly when their interests are squared up against those of illegal immigrants, LGBTQ activists, feminists, government workers, and anti-white racialists. It has been left to the populist right to take up the cause of the proletariat, which, whether or not one agrees with all his proposed policies, Vance is at least trying to do. The rest of the conservative establishment, apparently, is happy to leave these votes on the table.