Sci vs. Sci

In the recent and highly visible debate between the Thomas Frank and Larry Bartels camps, I feel that the latter presents a more accurate and compelling argument. In his writings, Frank posits that America’s working class has been misled by Republican promises to reinvigorate the nation’s moral scruples. He argues that the historically left-leaning working class is, in effect, voting against their own economic well-being, choosing instead to focus on social and moral issues in selecting political candidates. Frank feels that conservatives have been able to exploit the generally moralistic nature of the lower classes of society as a means to securing control over government. Bartels, and I alike, disagree.

I feel that Bartels presents more than enough evidence to prove his claim that the lowest socio-economic classes are becoming, in fact, more liberal. In his essay, “What’s the Matter with What’s the Matter with Kansas,” Bartels presents statistics that show the members of the lower-third of our nation’s income distribution becoming more economically-driven and less moralistically-driven. He effectively debunks Frank’s claim that the working-class is becoming less liberal. By demonstrating that white, working-class citizens without college degrees (the demographic studied by Frank) regard social issues as less salient than economic issues, Bartels begins to systematically deconstruct Frank’s argument. Bartels also shows that had Frank chose to include non-white workers, he could have easily concluded that Democratic party-identification has showed a slight increase among that group over the past fifty years.

Bartels’ central, and most effective, argument is to show that any de-Democratization or shift to moral-over-economic salience in the middle-class is actually occurring among those who make more money. The real shift, Bartels demonstrates, is not among the lower-working-class, but among the upper-middle-class. Instead, Bartels shows that lower-working-class citizens chose candidates based more on economic positions than on moral ones, and that only in the upper-middle-class is the case reversed. This, in effect, defeats Frank’s claims.

I will say, however, that Frank’s writing may have had more credence in the year it was written. Attempting to explain the Republicans’ strangle hold on Congress and the Executive branch, Frank posits a plausible argument for our nation’s general shift towards conservatism. Though his writing is well-composed and well-stylized, I feel he limited his views on the general condition of America’s working-class by limiting (and sometimes skewing) the portions of the group he chose to focus on. While his explanation of Republican control from the mid-nineties to the mid-‘00s may have been believable four years ago, it certainly can no longer be considered so. Given the current state of our nation’s economic system, it is ludicrous to believe that working-class citizens are focusing on moral and social issues rather than economic ones in their voting behaviors. Though Frank’s theories may have had a good run, their time has surely passed.