Class and Nation: Intersectional Identities and Attitudes Toward Inequality

• In Event: Social Identity and Beliefs on Welfare and Immigration

Abstract

Wealth inequality has increased dramatically in the United States over the past 50 years, yet polling shows that despite being broadly concerned about inequality, the American public is hesitant to support any substantial economic redistribution measures and mostly buys into the mythology of the “American Dream” regarding social mobility. Why do Americans continue to be concerned about inequality yet support the system that creates it nonetheless? Existing work has addressed some form of this question by looking at a variety of factors such as economic self-interest, sociotropic concerns, ideology, partisanship, elite messaging, and system justification. We synthesize a number of these concepts under the umbrella of a novel theoretical framework built on an intersectional social identity approach. We argue attitudes toward wealth inequality are a function of the intersection between one’s national and class identity. Specifically, we argue attitudes toward wealth inequality are influenced by one’s perception of the national group and their place in it vis-à-vis class. Drawing on Social Identity Theory (SIT), we argue that when the national group is salient, it brings to mind one’s perception of the prototypical group member (i.e., the prototypical American), and that individuals then evaluate wealth inequality through the lens of the national group and their relation to the prototypical group member. In particular, whereas middle- and upper-class individuals assume inclusion in the national group, lower-class individuals experience a state of “chronic exclusion.” In the U.S., we therefore expect lower-class individuals’ attitudes toward inequality to be driven by ideological concerns regardless of the salience of the national group because they perceive themselves as tangential to national ingroup concerns. However, among middle- and upper-class individuals, the implications of national identity salience should differ by ideology. We expect priming the national group to bring to mind a different perception of the American public for liberals than for conservatives. To conservatives, the national group is homogenous and predominantly White and Christian, whereas to liberals, the national group is diverse. As such, among members of the middle and upper class, increased salience of one’s national identity should lead conservatives be more supportive of redistribution and liberals to be less supportive of redistribution. In other words, we expect national identity salience to bring middle- and upper-class liberals and conservatives closer together in their views toward wealth inequality. We analyzed data from 782 U.S. adults collected through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk) to test our expectations. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four experimental conditions that used writing prompts to prime either national identity, class identity, both national and class identities, or neither identity. Results largely support our model, with middle- and upper-class liberals expressing less concern over wealth inequality and lower support for redistributive policies when primed with national identity, and middle- and upper-class conservatives displaying the opposite. Further, text analysis of participants’ responses to the writing prompts supports our argument that this is due to the different perceptions of the American public that national identity brings to mind for liberals versus conservatives. Findings are discussed in terms of implications for understanding attitudes toward wealth inequality and economic redistribution, the consequences of national and class identities, and political polarization in the U.S.

Authors

• Elizabeth Theiss-Morse, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

• Frank John Gonzalez, University of Arizona