Perspectives

Current issues

J. D. Vance’s introduction to his book Hillbilly Elegy. A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis was published in 2017 and deals with current issues in the US, namely the causes of the lack of social mobility among the white working class, discrimination, and poverty.

These issues are often studied and debated in American society. For instance, a study from 2018 which analysed data from 1994 to 2016 has shown that people who are born in high-status families are more likely to also have well-paid jobs compared to people who are born in poverty. In the political arena, politicians can use working class frustrations to gain political votes. This was most recently shown in Donald Trump’s 2016 electoral campaign, who frequently promised to bring back the working class people's jobs and prosperity.

Because Trump's election victory was so surprising - and has to some extent been credited to the white working class - it is also likely to have increased the general US population's interest in ...