When Hard Work Stops Paying

How Trump Hijacked the American Dream to Shield Oligarchy

In Trump’s America, we are rapidly learning that the old notion of “hard work pays off” no longer holds true. The virtue of working hard rings hollow in an era when the average American family is far worse off than when the so-called “Reagan Revolution” launched over forty years ago.

Consider this: it now takes two wage earners to afford a home, while in the 1950s and 60s, one income could cover the mortgage, a car, healthcare, and a college education for the kids. What’s more, that home wasn’t just a roof over one’s head; it was a path to building equity and retiring with security.

Today, by contrast, home ownership is increasingly slipping out of reach. Major financial firms like BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street are buying up single-family homes, out-bidding middle-class families and forcing millions into rental markets dominated by these same corporate landlords. In doing so, these corporations have robbed the middle class of one of its last reliable sources of wealth accumulation.

This growing sense of economic betrayal — that hard work no longer leads to stability, let alone prosperity — is fertile ground for demagogues. Trump saw the frustration and anger of hardworking Americans, and rather than fixing it, he hijacked it. He cloaked himself in populist rhetoric, promising to fight for the forgotten men and women, while his policies funneled trillions to billionaires and corporations, deepening the very crisis that fuels popular rage.

Making the situation worse, corporations have been granted many of the legal rights as individual citizens. As Mitt Romney infamously said during his 2012 campaign, “Corporations are people.” He was ridiculed for it, but in the cold light of political reality, he wasn’t wrong. Decades of Supreme Court decisions — from Buckley v. Valeo to Bellotti to Citizens United — have cemented the legal fiction that corporations are people, with all the rights and none of the responsibilities. This opened the floodgates for oligarchic power to capture government, media, and now, disturbingly, the military.

That’s the dangerous collision course we’re on. The ultra-wealthy, having seized control of the levers of government, now face a public that increasingly has nothing to lose. And history tells us what happens when desperate people confront systems designed to keep them down: they rebel.

The real question is, how will our political leaders respond? So far, the pattern is clear. Rather than address the root causes — economic exploitation, corporate greed, systemic inequality — they reach for the levers of force. Los Angeles offers a chilling preview: Marines deployed against citizens protesting authoritarian overreach. This wasn’t an isolated act of repression. It was a test; a trial balloon to see how far Americans can be pushed before they push back.

But here’s what Trump and his enablers fail to grasp: America is not a nation of submissives. Our spirit of independence, our stubborn refusal to bow, is woven into our DNA. Attempts at forced submission will not extinguish the will of the people; on the contrary, it will pour fuel on the flames of resistance.

We are now at a crossroads. Will our leaders recognize that economic justice is the only true path to stability? Or will they continue down the dark road of repression, provoking the kind of social explosion that could tear apart the fabric of our republic?

That choice is theirs — and ours.

Originally published in The Frontline Progressive, June 17, 2025