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Transcript

What is the Working Class · Mechonomist Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: The working class has become a renewed topic on social media.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: If you go over to threads where all the idiots are,
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: they're all arguing about what is and isn't working class
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: and there's some discussion.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: On Substack, which is better, it's actually people who want to engage intellectually.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: The old sort of definition of working class is who owns the means of production is
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: the bourgeoisie and who does not own the means of production is the working class.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that's necessarily true anymore
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: because capitalism has advanced dramatically since the times of those formulations.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that what you have to look at is a relationship between
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: how income,
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: employment, ownership, and power relate to what someone does For most of their life.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: So class is not, first of all, it's not an identity.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's something somebody does.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's a practice.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: There are subjective parts to class, such as class cultures like Borgia talked about.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: But primarily class is something you do when you turn a wrench, when you change a diaper.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, when you hammer a nail, that's what class is.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's something that you do.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I think that there are probably most likely intellectual
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: and intellectual working class that primarily works on computers and that can range
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: from anything from someone who works at a call center to somebody who,
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: uh, Is a policy analyst for a nonprofit to somebody who is a freelance journalist.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: So just because it's a physical job doesn't mean it's exclusively working class.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Just because you're poor doesn't mean that you're working class.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: There are plenty of working class people that make good livings per year.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: But like I said,
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: it's primarily about a historically produced relationship based
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: on institutional arrangements between ownership, income and power.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: And those relationships produce an action that is a working class action and that is
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: the practice of being working class.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that the mistake that people are making is thinking that it's identity.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: The primary difference between identity and class is that identity happens in the past.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's about history, lineage, experience, ancestry, collective experience, trauma.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: All of these things happen before now.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And class is something you do now and in the future.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: You do in the present and in the future.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: When I turn a wrench, I'm doing it right now.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And if I am a working class person, my future consists of turning those wrenches in the future.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about where I came from.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: In fact,
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: someone who has a wealthy family can certainly be working class if they are turning
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: a wrench.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Or changing a diaper or hammering a nail.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: So just because you grew up rich or you grew up poor, that's not a determinant of what class is.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Class is the current institutional relationships,
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: how they produce relationships between power, income,
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: and ownership, and how that set of social relations produces the practice of class.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know,
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: I think when we're thinking about what class means,
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: we need to steer clear of the idea that it's static and that it's an identity.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's something that evolves over time and evolves with
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: the institutional relationships of capital and Possibly even socialism and communism
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: under time.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Communism is supposed to be a classless society.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: Socialism is not a classless society.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the relationships of the working class will change and what class is will change.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: So class is not a static category that one can just slide somebody into.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's a dynamic category that changes with institutional arrangements.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, that's my little class blog for today.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't done one in a while for my new subscribers.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Dr. Zach Hyden.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: I go by Zach Hyden.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm an ASC certified auto tech.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: I run a little automotive diagnostics firm and I run
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: a consulting firm called NextSouth Strategy.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: I have a couple of jobs and I work at a parts store, primary caregiver for my son.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm pretty busy.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: I try to do a lot of things, try to stay dynamic.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, it's nice to meet y'all, all of my new subscribers, and stay tuned for more commentary.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.