Union Perspectives

Princeton and Northwest universities did a study recently of our government structure and economic state of affairs and determined our democracy has turned into an oligarchy. The report entitled, “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups and Average Citizens,” used extensive policy data collected from between the years 1981 through 2002 to empirically determine the state of the U.S. political system. The researchers concluded that the U.S. government policies rarely align with the preferences of the majority of Americans, but do favor special interests and lobbying organizations. When a majority of the citizens disagrees with economic elites or with organized interests they lose. Niccolo Machiavelli, who wrote the books, “The Prince” and “The Art of War” around the year 1513, pointed out the three types of good government and how they can slip into a bad type of government for the masses. At this time we are an oligarchy form of government, which the study conclu...