alt Hacker NewsIt is explained in the Alden piece, section "The Fraying of the Petrodollar System", subsection "The Triffin Dilemma Unfolds".
What I meant was "blue collar working class" as opposed to the neo-artistocrat professional class. The Triffin Dilemma is a contributor to the K shaped economy and rise of populism.
>And from there, the value of the system depends on who you ask. Folks who are often on the higher end of the income spectrum who worked in finance, government, healthcare, or technology benefitted from this system, since they obtained many of the benefits of globalization and none of the drawbacks. Folks who are often on the lower end of the income spectrum, specifically those that make physical things, are the ones that benefitted least and gave the most up, since their jobs were outsourced and automated at a faster rate than other developed countries. But now with China also undermining the structure of the system, even the geopolitical/hegemonic benefits for the political class are subverted as well.
I guess I'm not seeing anything tying the trade deficit to the destruction of unions, to the massive reduction in top tax rates resulting in higher CEO compensation, etc.
The piece puts increasing trade deficits next to lots of stuff about increasing inequality, but it does not make the case that trade deficits are the cause of increasing inequality.
There's a person that had a job making physical things, but they are not inherently a "person that only makes physical things." The idea that bringing back the making of physical things will make these people wealthier is, well, suspicious. Unions? Better taxations systems? Modernizing manufacturing so that each worker is far more productive and we can compete with the world? That may help. But reducing trade deficits will not fix any of the K shaped economy.