I did not say that. I said the working poor are suffering under the policies of progressive liberalism and illustrated that by showing how quickly states dominated by progressive liberalism are going downhill.
Nor is your assertion that you know more people that would be classified as working poor based on fact. Can you even find a "Democratic" poll that supports your assertion that most working poor are progressive liberals "deep down" but vote for Trump anyways since that is his base.
Which state whose governorship and legislative bodies are dominated by progressive liberals are prospering? Which of those states are experiencing a flood of working poor migrating to them?
People are not dumb, but some ideologues. My brother was the first Republican mayor of Jersey City in 75 years and lead the city to a renaissance. He joked that the Republican party met every morning in his kitchen for coffee.
When asked how he won in a city so heavily Democratic, he responded that you can never win over the Irish and Italian generational Democrats and so he did not even try. But minorities do change their party affiliation based on which party appeals to their needs.
He ran on education, creating jobs, lowering crime, and lowering property taxes. Seniors loved him, because high property taxes were forcing them out of their homes. Yuppies like him, because they could afford to fix up properties and not get hammered by higher appraisals. Minorities loved him because he lowered crime in their neighborhoods by putting a police officer on every corner. He also attracted more new jobs to the city by creating an "enterprise zone". His only failure was public education. He could not fight through the resistance to make the schools better.
Shortly after he left office, he founded BeLoved. A charter school in Jersey City. The school has over 2200 students now and last year 100% of the senior class graduated, 94% got accepted into college, and 75% come from families living below the poverty line. The school is also over 60% African American.
He is a Harvard graduate and started life out after college working for progressive liberal politicians until he became dissuaded by the hypocrisy of their behavior and ineffectiveness of their policies. He will be the first to tell you Republican politicians are no less hypocritical, but at the end of the day, policies provide the framework to make the world a better place.
That framework involves creating an environment that encourages job creation.
And an education system that provides the poor the training and skills to fill good paying jobs.
If employers are moving away, your political representatives have failed you... it is really that simple.
If employers cannot find the talent they need among local citizens, your educational system has failed you. People can have political opinions about how the country should work, but if the government is not providing the environment to create jobs and people don't have the skills to fill those jobs, then your educational system has failed.
Safety is the last critical attribute. Employers and citizens do not want to locate in places where their businesses and their families are unsafe.
Against all these three key measures, the State of California is failing. You might find a specific policy great, but big picture if crime is not under control, employers are not adding jobs, and citizens are not equipped to fill those jobs, government stinks.
The working poor are not ideologues, but they do understand unemployment, they do understand high crime, and they do understand when they don't get hired because they don't have the skills for a specific job.
They do understand when their job gets shipped overseas and new jobs are not opening up, that something is wrong. I started at the bottom working as an aide in a hospital, flipping burgers at McDonalds, and loading trucks. It was the incentive for me to focus on a college major that paid well and has plenty of job opportunities.
When I became an executive, I always insisted that we help fund our employees continuing education even if that meant losing them someday because we did not have a job for their enhanced skills (though often we did). As a compassionate conservative classical liberal, I believe nothing generates more opportunity than societal prosperity. Killing the goose laying the golden eggs, may produce a bountiful goose dinner, but after that comes starvation.
Regarding whether the working poor are "progressives", I am a cynic. To me you truly believe in something if it costs you. If the working poor believe in progressive liberalism knowing it is costing them income, jobs, and safety, then they are true progressive liberals, but if they have been misled into thinking that progressive liberalism produces jobs and opportunities, they are victims.
