Hillbilly Elegy

In 2016,J.D. Vance informally launched his political career with "Hillbilly Elegy," a memoir that blames the relative poverty of Appalachian and Rust Belt populations on their own culture. Despite its reactionary premise, mainstream and liberal press outlets were so enamored by the book that they accidentally made Vance a senator.

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Sources:

• Appalachian Reckoning
• America’s Divided Recovery
• What Did Hillbilly Elegy Get Wrong?
• J.D. Vance, the False Prophet of Blue America
• HillbillyElitism
• WelfareQueens and White Trash
• ConsumerExpenditures in 2016
• HouseholdExpenditures and Income
• CFPBData Point: Payday Lending

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