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Bi-Weekly Discussion - Is the Managerial Class Hurting America?

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Brian B.
Bi-Weekly Discussion - Is the Managerial Class Hurting America?

Details

This is going to be an online meetup using Zoom. If you've never used Zoom before, don't worry — it's easy to use and free to join.

Here's the link to the event: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87494012656?pwd=L3Q2VUpWNlFzOUp1S3lXNUdlWnlrUT09

Meeting ID: 874 9401 2656
Passcode: 814369

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IS THE "PROFESSIONAL MANAGERIAL CLASS" HURTING AMERICA?

INTRODUCTION - HISTORY OF THE "PMC" CONCEPT:

In this meetup, we'll look at a variety of recent criticisms of America's upper middle class, variously defined as people who fall into either the top 10% (over $200K in 2019) or top 20% (over $140K in 2019) in annual household income. Much of the upper middle class overlaps with what is known by sociologists as the "professional managerial class" (abbreviated as PMC) - i.e. a group of middle to upper-middle class professionals is distinguished from other social classes by their training & education, with occupations including academics, civil servants, engineers, managers, doctors, lawyers, and middle-level business executives & government administrators. Defined broadly, the PMC accounts for about a third of the American workforce, but we'll be focused on those with higher income and more political & cultural influence.

The history of the PMC concept dates back to James Burnham's 1941 book The Managerial Revolution which theorized about the future of world capitalism based upon its development in the interwar period. Analyzing the emerging forms of society around the world, Burnham saw certain commonalities between the economic formations of Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, and America under FDR's New Deal. He argued that a new society was emerging in which a class of "managers" had waged a drive for "the position of ruling class." He argued that whether ownership was corporate/private or statist/governmental, the essential spit between the ruling elite (executives and managers backed by bureaucrats and functionaries) and the mass of society was not ownership so much as control of the means of production.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Burnham#The_Managerial_Revolution

In his 1944 essay in "Second Thoughts on James Burnham", George Orwell's criticized some of the near-term predictions Burnham made about the course of WWII (e.g. German victory) and what he saw as Burnham's "power worship", but he accepted that Burnham might be right in identifying a general drift towards oligarchy with the concentration of industrial and financial power, and the development of the managerial/technical class. However, Orwell thought there was no way this managerial revolution could enable fascism or Soviet-style communism to last for long, arguing: "The huge, invincible, everlasting slave empire of which Burnham appears to dream will not be established, or if established, will not endure." As we'll see, Orwell's thoughts are typical of the opposition to the managerial class today among the anti-authoritarian left, particularly democratic socialists.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Thoughts_on_James_Burnham

Orwell noted that the theme of a new technocratic type of society – neither capitalist nor socialist – was predicted in several works such as Hillaire Belloc's 1912 book The Servile State. Belloc was a Catholic conservative and felt that neither capitalism nor socialism was stable or just, but feared the third possibility of a highly unequal technocratic "Servile State" as well. Belloc advocated for "distributism" - i.e. distribution of the means of production to create a society marked by widespread property ownership. Later Catholic conservative thinkers, although less enthusiastic about distributism, have shared some of Belloc's concerns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Servile_State

Belloc's book was in turn an influence on Friedrich Hayek's 1944 Road to Serfdom, which led later generations of libertarians to fear the erosion of individual freedom entailed by creeping government control of economic decision-making.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_to_Serfdom

Although Burnham was initially a Trotskyite, his political views shifted to the right after WWII and his 1964 book Suicide of the West became a classic text for the post-war conservative movement in American politics. Burnham defined liberalism as a "syndrome" afflicting liberals with guilt & hypocrisy. His works greatly influenced paleoconservative author Samuel T. Francis, who used Burnham's ideas to develop theories about the "managerial state", which he equated with the "welfare-warfare state" and "polite totalitarianism". Many of today's paleocon borrow from Francis's ideas when they rail against "globalism". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Managerial_state

Taken together, we can get a sense of the various political factions that were aligning against the "managerial state" in the early-to-mid 20th century, and in this discussion we'll see how this is still going on today in terms of how many different groups on both sides of the political spectrum we see complaining about the "professional-managerial class".

RELEVANT MATERIAL FROM PAST MEETUPS:

Back in June of 2019, we had a meetup entitled "Are Coastal Elites Living in a 'Bubble'?" We talked about the residential segregation we'll discuss in Part 1 of this meetup, but we also talked about the economist Tyler Cowen & the sociologist Charles Murray's theories about how the cultural segregation of urban elites has negative social effects. We also looked at arguments related to an alleged ideological bubble around the coastal elites' narrower class of pundits, journalists & academics that creates blind spots in their political views. Specifically we analyzed Paul Krugman's critique of "Very Serious People" and Nicholas Nassim Taleb's critique of "Intellectuals Yet Idiots", as well as Daniel Drezner's critique of "thought leaders".
https://www.meetup.com/Philadelphia-Political-Agnostics/events/chrnnqyzhbjc/

In Aug. 2019, we had a meetup where we discussed the social & economic forces that drive up the cost of housing in many cities, leading to residential segregation - https://www.meetup.com/Philadelphia-Political-Agnostics/events/txqhxqyzlbpb/

In May 2020, Profs & Pints hosted philosophy professor Olufemi Táíwò for a talk entitled "How the Elite Captured Identity Politics" where he explained how the phenomenon of "elite capture" works.
https://www.meetup.com/Philadelphia-Political-Agnostics/events/270765142/

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DIRECTIONS ON HOW TO PREPARE FOR OUR DISCUSSION:

The videos & articles you see linked below are intended to give you a basic overview of some of the major debates over allegations that the upper middle class are causing a variety of social problems. As usual, I certainly don't expect you to read all the articles prior to attending our discussion. The easiest way to prepare for our discussion is to just watch the numbered videos linked under each section - the videos come to about about 44 minutes total. The articles marked with asterisks are just there to supply additional details. You can browse and look at whichever ones you want, but don't worry - we'll cover the stuff you missed in our discussion.

In terms of the discussion format, my general idea is that we'll address the topics in the order presented here. I figure we'll spend about 30 minutes on each section.

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I. RICHARD FLORIDA'S "NEW URBAN CRISIS", JOEL KOTKIN'S "LUXURY CITIES" & MICHAEL SHELLENBERGER'S "VICTIMOLOGY":

  • IS THE INCREASING RACIAL & CLASS SEGREGATION IN CITIES THE INEVITABLE OUTCOME OF ATTRACTING THE HIGH-INCOME "CREATIVE CLASS", OR CAN INNOVATION BE UNCOUPLED FROM GENTRIFICATION?
  • WAS THE SUBURBAN POPULISM THAT ELECTED ROB FORD MAYOR OF TORONTO A BACKLASH AGAINST GENTRIFICATION, AS RICHARD FLORIDA CONTENDS? IF SO, IS IT BECOMING A POLITICAL FORCE IN THE U.S.?
  • IS THE URBAN PLANNING TREND TOWARD "SMART GROWTH" EFFECTIVELY A "WAR ON SUBURBIA" THAT SEEKS TO FORCE MOST PEOPLE (OTHER THAN ELITES) TO LIVE IN TINY HIGHRISE APARTMENTS IN DENSE CITIES, AS KOTKIN ARGUES?
  • IS SHELLENBERGER RIGHT THAT AN OVERLY PERMISSIVE ATTITUDE TOWARDS VAGRANCY, ADDICTION & PETTY CRIME RUINING PROGRESSIVE CITIES? OR ARE THESE ISSUES MORE RELATED TO THE HIGH COST OF LIVING & INADEQUATE SOCIAL SPENDING - AND IS DECRIMINALIZATION PART OF THE SOLUTION?
  • IS THE URBAN CRISIS LARGELY CAUSED BY LIBERAL HYPOCRISY - E.G. REGRESSIVE TAXES, INADEQUATE FUNDING OF SCHOOLS IN LOWER-INCOME NEIGHBORHOODS, AND NIMBYISM THAT PREVENTS AFFORDABLE HOUSING, AS HARRIS & APPLEBAUM ARGUE?

1a) Richard Florida, "The New Urban Crisis" (video - 2:52 min.)
https://youtu.be/Khe0_6W00vk

1b) Joel Kotkin, "Are liberal elites using cities to create a feudal society?" (video - 4:23 min.)
https://youtu.be/WKhNDst-bag

1c) Michael Shellenberger, "San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities" (video - 5:36 min, start at 0:25)
https://youtu.be/ZxngOBbOdXk&t=25s

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II. DECLINING SOCIAL MOBILITY, RICHARD REEVES' "DREAM HOARDERS" & MATTHEW STEWART'S "NEW ARISTOCRACY"

  • HOW HAVE INCOMES IN THE TOP 10% & TOP 20% FARED OVER THE LAST SEVERAL DECADES? EVEN IF MOST HAVEN'T SEEN A BIG RISE IN INCOME SIMILAR TO THE TOP 1%, HAS THE UPPER-MIDDLE CLASS BEEN IMMUNE TO THE WAGE STAGNATION THAT HAS PLAGUED MUCH OF THE LOWER-MIDDLE & WORKING CLASSES?
  • ARE THE INCREASING ACADEMIC CREDENTIALS REQUIRED FOR MANY PROFESSIONS A FORM OF "DREAM HOARDING" - I.E. AN ENTRY BARRIER THAT KEEPS OUT A LOT OF THE COMPETITION FOR HIGHER-PAYING JOBS?
  • HAS INCOME MOBILITY DECLINE IN RECENT DECADES, OR IS IT THE "SPACES BETWEEN THE RUNGS" THAT HAS INCREASED (PER RAJ CHETTY)?
  • DOES THE FACT THAT THE 9.9% (I.E. TOP 10% MINUS THE TOP 0.1% OF INCOME EARNERS) HOLD MOST OF THE WEALTH IN AMERICA MAKE THEM A "NEW ARISTOCRACY" OR ARE THESE MOSTLY JUST MIDDLE-CLASS PEOPLE WHO HAVE A 401K & OWN HOMES?

2a) The Atlantic w/ Matthew Stewart, "The 99% Is a Myth—Here's How It Really Breaks Down" (video - 3:04 min.)
https://youtu.be/hb28kAavh0M

2b) PBS w/ Richard Reeves, "How the upper middle class keeps everyone else out" (video - 7:09 min)
https://youtu.be/QPnxOOeY1Kg

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III. YASCHA MOUNK'S "UNDEMOCRATIC LIBERALISM", MICHAEL LIND'S "NEW CLASS WAR" & JOEL KOTKIN'S "NEO-FEUDALISM"

  • HOW ACCURATE ARE THE POLLS THAT CLAIM TO SHOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE BECOME DISILLUSIONED WITH DEMOCRACY OVER THE LAST DECADE? IS THIS STRONGER AMONG THE UPPER-MIDDLE CLASS (I.E. THE PMC)?
  • IS RIGHT-WING POPULISM CAUSED BY WHITE RACISM, OR IS IT THE SAME ECONOMIC ANXIETY THAT LED TO LEFT-WING POPULISM?
  • COULD ELITE EFFORTS TO STIMY POPULISM & PROMOTE LIBERALISM LEAD TO AN OVERCORRECTION THAT FAVORS TECHNOCRACY OVER DEMOCRACY?
  • DOES THE PMC BENEFIT FROM LOW-WAGE IMMIGRATION & DEFEND IT BY ACCUSING CRITICS OF "RACISM", AS LIND ARGUES?
  • DOES FREE TRADE & OUTSOURCING BENEFIT THE PMC AT THE EXPENSE OF THE WORKING CLASS, AS LIND ARGUES?
  • IS RISING INCOME INEQUALITY PUSHING US TOWARDS A "NEO-FEUDAL" SOCIETY WITH NO MIDDLE CLASS, AS KOTKIN FEARS?
  • HAS THE COVID PANDEMIC HARMED THE WORKING CLASS WHILE ENRICHING MAJOR CORPORATIONS & EMPOWERING TECHNOCRATS, AS KOTKIN ARGUES?
  • COULD YASCHA MOUNK'S PROPOSED REFORMS (I.E. CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM, ECONOMIC REDISTRIBUTION, CIVIC NATIONALISM) HELP AVOID THE POPULIST BACKLASH?

3a) Yascha Mounk, "The Crisis of Liberal Democracy" (video - 5:22 min)
https://youtu.be/D8H-2xciXfY

3b) The Hill w/ Michael Lind, "The New Class War author: How the PMC ruined everything" (video - 9:05 min)
https://youtu.be/RpakMRm6mmo

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IV. CHRISTOPHER LASCH'S "REVOLT OF THE ELITES", CHRIS HAYES' "TWILIGHT OF THE ELITES" & ROB HENDERSON'S "LUXURY BELIEFS"

  • DOES TRUMPIAN POPULISM REPRESENT A "REVOLT OF THE MASSES"? HAS IT BEEN MET BY A "REVOLT OF THE ELITES" AMONG DEMOCRATS?
  • IS THE DISDAIN FOR MIDDLE AMERICA & "ROOTLESS COSMOPOLITANISM" THAT CHRISTOPHER LASCH SPOKE OF IN HIS BOOK REVOLT OF THE ELITES (1994) NOW A PART OF UPPER-MIDDLE CLASS IDEOLOGY, AS ROBERT MERRY ARGUES?
  • DOES THE IDEOLOGY OF "MERITOCRACY" INEVITABLY CREATE AN OLIGARCHY AS ELITES RIG THE SYSTEM, AS CHRIS HAYES ARGUES, OR IS IT MORE ROBERT MICHELS' "IRON LAW OF OLIGARCHY" (I.E. ORGANIZATION CREATES HIERARCHY)?
  • ARE ELITE BELIEFS IN POLYAMORY, ATHEISM, OPEN BORDERS & DEFUNDING POLICE "LUXURY BELIEFS" THAT ARE DELETERIOUS WHEN THEY TRICKLE DOWN TO THE WORKING CLASS?

4a) The Generation Report, "The Revolt of the Masses & The Revolt of the Elites" (video - 5:36 min.)
https://youtu.be/goDEYExRKsY

4b) Chris Hayes, "The Lie of Meritocracy: Chris Hayes' Twilight of the Elites" (video - 5:55 min, start at 0:24)
https://youtu.be/bsD5qat1Jh8&t=24s

4c) Liam DeBoer, "Luxury Beliefs by Rob Henderson" (video - 5:50 min.)
https://youtu.be/1Ry2EP4FIxM

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