“Why is the working-class leaving the Democratic Party?”
A Zoom Conversation with Les Leopold ’69, Executive Director of The Labor Institute
There are two major theories to account for the extensive working-class shift to the Republicans since 1996. One argument rooted in social issues is that working-class resentment against women, immigrants, LBGTQ+ communities and other "woke" concerns has resulted in an embrace of right-wing candidates whose supporters Hillary Clinton once termed "a basket of deplorables".
The other theory is that economic issues like job insecurity, stagnant wages and declining prospects for the future have pushed workers away from the Democrats.
What does the data reveal?
Join Les Leopold who will offer an assessment based on findings in his latest book Wall Street's War on Workers: How Mass Layoffs and Greed Are Destroying the Working Class and What to Do About It.
Les Leopold ’69 co-founded and currently directs The Labor Institute, a non-profit organization that designs research and educational programs on occupational safety and health, the environment and economics for unions, workers centers and community organizations. In addition to Wall Street's War on Workers, he is the author of Defiant German, Defiant Jew; Runaway Inequality; How to Make a Million Dollars an Hour: Why Financial Elites get away with siphoning off America's Wealth; The Looting of America: How Wall Street's Game of Fantasy Finance destroyed our Jobs, Pensions and Prosperity, and What We Can Do About It; and The Man Who Hated Work and Loved Labor: The Life and Times of Tony Mazzocchi. Les graduated from Oberlin with a degree in Government and earned an MPA from Princeton University's School of Public and International Affairs.
