According to this week’s guest, economic analyst Rana Foroohar, the Democratic Party is facing an existential crisis. Those who were active in government during the start of neoliberal policymaking — and who perhaps even worked to implement it — are in the same party as new legislators who have seen the catastrophic effects of those policies on the working-class people they represent.
Understanding the Democrats’ political conundrum means understanding the history of neoliberalism in American politics, focusing on the Thatcher-Reagan era and its hard swing toward globalization, deregulation, and outright attacks on organized labor. Rana’s assessment of where we’re at now is that it’s a pendulum swing in the opposite direction of the Reagan-Thatcher period. The Democrats, especially with Biden in office, have what Rana sees as an opportunity to lead us out of that moment and to escape the harm done by decades of neoliberal policy. Whether or not they’re up to that task is up for discussion on Episode 97 of KK&F, and we hope you enjoy the debate.
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