After the Fall: Being American in the World We've Made

by Ben Rhodes

The economy that I’ve lived in most of my life is shaped by this dynamic. American manufacturing jobs were displaced to China. Cheaper goods facilitated bargain shopping that started at places like Target and Walmart and migrated to Amazon. Electronics emerged from supply chains designed as intricately as your smartphone—ideas from Silicon Valley and chips made in America to be assembled in China and sold back to Americans. Things worked out very well for the people at the top, and everyone else owed the illusion of rising standards of living to a basic bargain—the cost of education and health care and housing kept going up, but at least you could buy cheap household goods, drive a big car, and entertain yourself on a phone that offered the promise—or distraction—of infinite immersion. Meanwhile, the rich people who could own stocks and trade in markets got wealthier and translated that wealth into political, social, and cultural influence.