Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland

by Jonathan M. Metzl

The book’s final section takes us to Kansas, where citizens struggle with the aftermath of a Tea Party–fueled economic “experiment” led by controversial Governor Sam Brownback, in which the largest income tax cut in state history turned the state budget surplus into a substantial deficit. Parents and school administrators describe how politicians often framed the resultant cuts to Kansas public schools as ways to punish “wasteful” minority districts who supposedly splurged on “party busses” instead of classrooms. And indeed, early budget cuts overwhelmingly impacted schools in low-income minority districts. But these initial cuts were not enough to fill the gaping holes in state budgets. Soon, as a thoughtful Kansas state legislator told me, “the fire that we set in the fields burned all the way up to the home.”