Second Class - by Batya Ungar-Sargon (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A personal, journalistic ethnography of the modern American working class, based on the travels and interactions of the author through the American heartland.

"Second Class is the most important book you will read all year. A political realignment is coming, and it's my hope that the end result will work in favor of our all-too-neglected American working class. When that realignment comes, Batya and her book will help lead the way."

--Greg Lukianoff, CEO of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, and co-author of The Coddling of the American Mind

Who is the American working class? Do they still have a fair shot at the American Dream? What do they think about their chances to secure the hallmarks of a middle-class life?

While writing this book, Batya Ungar-Sargon visited states across the nation to speak with members of the American working class who are fighting tooth and nail to survive. In Second Class, working-class Americans of all races, political orientations, and occupations share their stories--cleaning ladies, health care aides, cops, truck drivers, fast food workers, electricians, and more. In their own words, these working-class Americans explain the struggles and triumphs of their increasingly precarious lives--as well as what policies they think would improve them. Second Class combines deep reporting with a look at the data and expert opinions on America's emergent class divide, in which the most basic elements of a secure and stable life are increasingly out of reach for those without a college education.

America has broken its contract with its laboring class. So, how do we get back to the American Dream? How do we once again become the land of opportunity, the promised land, where hard work and commitment to family are enough to protect you from poverty? It's not that hard actually. All it would take, as this book illustrates, is for those in power to once again respect the dignity of work--and the American worker.

Review Quotes

"While our politicians and academics fight about this is and that, most working Americans are simply doing their best to achieve the American Dream--something they feel is slipping away from them. Pick up a newspaper, switch on cable news, and you only hear about the elites, almost nothing of the workers. Batya's book, does the opposite. It focuses on working Americans: Their concerns, their fears, and despite that, ultimately their love of being American, notwithstanding all our flaws."

--Chris Arnade, author of Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America

"The gravest threat to our republic is an elite determined to rule a nation that it no longer cares to understand. In Second Class, Batya Ungar-Sargon has done the hard work for them, illuminating the lives of the common men and women whose diverse hopes, fears, priorities, and challenges must return to the center of our politics. Put down whatever book you're reading by an expert eager to lecture you about America and read this one instead, by someone who has taken the time to learn about it."

--Oren Cass, founder and executive director, American Compass

"Second Class is the most important book you will read all year. A political realignment is coming, and it's my hope that the end result will work in favor of our all-too-neglected American working class. When that realignment comes, Batya and her book will help lead the way."

--Greg Lukianoff, CEO of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, and co-author of The Coddling of the American Mind

About the Author

Batya Ungar-Sargon is the opinion editor of Newsweek and the author of Bad News: How Woke Media Is Undermining Democracy. She lives in Brooklyn.