Robert Reich (Why The Republican's Old Divide-and-Conquer Strategy -- Setting Working Class Against the Poor -- Is Backfiring)
It used to be that working people thought that hard work and thrift would get them ahead in the world. And it used to be that it would. So it was easy to say "They're giving your hard earned money to those lay good-for-nothings." Whether it was true or not, it played into the narrative of getting rich through hard work.
But it's increasingly clear that working hard in not the road to riches. Well, not working hard yourself, anyway. The wealthy today are most likely those who get other people to wok hard for them, and then don't pay them for it.
So there's not much derision (or shouldn't be) for less fortunate people among those who are just barely making it. And since 95% of the US population is worse off as a share of total wealth than they were in 1980, 4% are about the same, and 1% are enormously better off, especially the top 0.01%, it's hard to say it's the poor who are taking our money.
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