Sobering Thoughts.

By THOMAS B. EDSALL
Contributing Op-Ed Writer

It’s easy for liberals to explain away setbacks to programs and policies that they favor — ranging from infrastructure investment to food stamps to increased education budgets — as the result of the intransigence of the Republican Party, with its die-hard commitment to slashing government spending on nearly every front.

But that explanation is too facile.

Two years ago, Mike Konczal, a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, opened a productive line of inquiry in a blog post called “Are We at the Completion of the Liberal Project?”
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In practice, Konczal writes, the political left has abandoned its quest for deep structural reform — full employment and worker empowerment — and instead has “doubled-down” on the safety net strategy. The result, in his view, is “a kind of pity-charity liberal capitalism.”

Konczal’s poignant description of the problem goes a long way towards explaining the current struggles of the left. The question is whether there is an effective worker empowerment strategy at a time of globalization, off-shoring and robotization.
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A mix of economic, social and political forces have weakened the clout of those in the bottom half of the income distribution. The list of forces is long, but its signal features are the decline in manufacturing jobs, the strengthening of the bargaining power of corporations, the gutting of middle income employment and competitive pressures to limit wage growth.

How did the Democrats let these developments gain momentum? It depends on how you see the world. Some progressives argue that the Democratic Party stood by and let it happen passively; others suggest that key segments on the left simply sold out to Wall Street.
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The shift of the Democratic Party from economic to “pity-charity” liberalism has put the entire liberal project in danger. It has increased its vulnerability to conservative challenge and left it without a base of politically mobilized supporters.