The rightward shift in public opinion that carried Donald Trump back into the White House is being widely interpreted as a backlash against the "Great Awokening" of the past decade — a surge in radical progressive activism around social justice issues that featured a number of extreme and unpopular positions ("defund the police," "abolish ICE," support for Hamas after the October 7 attacks, etc.).
The terms "normal worker" and "elite" are being used here without any real definition. As a first approximation, let's say that the "elite" of "symbolic workers" here means "people who can do their job from home". That's about 50 per cent of the workforce. In particular, information workers far outnumber the manual trades workers who are often presented as the archetype of "normal workers".
As regards the political analysis, white men are heavily over-represented among symbolic workers, and also among Trump voters . If we use college education as the divide, the data I've seen suggests that Trump got the support of at least 50 per cent of college-educated white men.
The terms "normal worker" and "elite" are being used here without any real definition. As a first approximation, let's say that the "elite" of "symbolic workers" here means "people who can do their job from home". That's about 50 per cent of the workforce. In particular, information workers far outnumber the manual trades workers who are often presented as the archetype of "normal workers".
As regards the political analysis, white men are heavily over-represented among symbolic workers, and also among Trump voters . If we use college education as the divide, the data I've seen suggests that Trump got the support of at least 50 per cent of college-educated white men.