Years ago I read an article by an author who framed this story as, "Who Did This to Us?" I remember the decline in jobs in the 1970s and 1980s and the need for women to enter the workforce to shore up household income. Yet the blame from the working class went to blacks and women for "taking our jobs" along with the federal government for the affirmative action and civil rights laws.
In the most recent Great Recession the blame went to illegal immigrants for "taking our jobs." Build that wall. The corporate-owned media did little to dispel this claim, and couple that with the alt-right news who encouraged this stance, it made this many-faceted issue into a jingoistic one.
In the meantime the greedy banksters are laughing at this scenario and grateful that no attention is being directed to them and their policies that are so ably carried out by their government minions in Congress.
This latest claim that it's liberal Democrats who "just don't understand" working class pain is another meme now offered up as a shiny distraction from that fact that global events and government actions directly affect everyone in this country, including the working class, but Americans need someone to blame vs. recognizing these truths and working to make things better for all.