Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I ordered this book for a couple of reasons. First, like Vance, I was born in KY (Laurel County) and grew up in Hamilton, Ohio. Hamilton is about 10-15 miles from MIddletown, so I thought I could have some connection. I do confess here that Vance is from my daughter's generation and that may color my observations. The second, substantive, reason was I believed the book would be a serious and informed commentary on the status of what amounted to 'white America,' following Murray's "Coming Apart." I made it half-way through and tired of reading something that, in the end, is neither fish nor fowl. It is more of a slightly narcissistic reflection on his own life and travails than anything else with a little dab/jab here and there of some odd social commentary/assertions about what is going on in our country that amounts to little more than the same charge and summarization that Kevin Williamson (Chaos in the Family, Chaos in the State) made in an editorial published in "National Review" earlier this year. Only thing there is that Williamson both said it better and used considerably less ink. Vancee makes toss-off coments that he evidently believes reflect a more general truth. A few poor people he knew growing up would take their food stamps, sell them at a discount, and buy (I guess) booze and cigarettes. Now I have no doubts that there are welfare cheaters out there. But to suggest or think that Vance's experience shows how common they are is both narrow and naive. He assumes an incisive insight in noting that southerners report they go to church more than any other group of Americans, but they are lying and really don't. Support for such assertions is scant. I am no bleeding heart liberal--I do not blame the 'system' for making the poor poor. But even the poor know that since 1970 incomes in the bottom four quintiles have been flat to negative while the hard-working 'creative class' that is on a steep, upward slope. There is not much reason to say work hard and get ahead--when the advice should be work hard and maybe you will stay even if you are lucky. Vance does in some ways admit he was astoundingly lucky. Even among the best and the brightest, the number of slots at Yale Law School is infinitesimally small compared to their numbers. Early in the book, Vance notes that many factories in Ohio disappeared and the few that are left are downsized and not paying much. He tips his hand by saying he likely would have made the same decision they did--leave Ohio--because it was a prudent, even necessary, economic decision. He is, in short, a free marketeer of the first order. That is the same free market that president-elect Trump railed against for exporting jobs. The bottom line is that Vance does not recognize the fear that motivated the poor to follow trump even as he, alas, was in a perect vantage point to see it.