Dr. Jack Goldstone

because they have a credential and are in a cultural institution.

So this is broadcast journalists, big time columnists, university faculties and deans, lawyers.

prominent urban officials and other government officials.

All of these people tend to be salaried well above average worker level, but they don't tend to be rich, like you say, except that broadcast journalists for networks, they make millions.

But most of us in the credentialed elite, I count myself part of that, we have relatively well-paid cushy jobs, but we have big voices, right?

I'm on a podcast.

Yeah.

Good for me, I'm not the biggest or the best, but all of us in this credentialed elite have really done badly by the average American.

I'm the first to blame credentialed elite for losing popular support because we claimed that we were building this credentialed elite to give a meritocratic leadership to America.

And yet this meritocratic leadership has failed.

We didn't avert the great housing collapse and the great recession in 2008, 2009.

We didn't prevent the dot-com stock bubble from collapsing.

So this credentialed elite in which Americans put a lot of faith, you know, you guys are supposed to be smart.

You're the experts.

You're supposed to kind of run these institutions so that our lives can be stable and pleasant and we don't have to worry about it.

and they failed.

And so they have really lost support.

And the plutocratic elite has kind of stepped in and taken advantage and said, yeah, all those cultural elites, they wanted to regulate business.

They wanted to raise taxes on the rich.

Don't listen to them.