In the wake of a bruising 2024 election, Democrats are looking to define their party’s identity and former Ohio U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown is offering a familiar answer.
With the launch of his Dignity of Work Institute, Brown is making the case for a politics focused on the cost of living for working class voters.
“We see what’s happened over the last 40 years,” Brown said in a press conference Monday. “Corporate profits have soared, executive compensation has exploded, and productivity keeps going up and up, but wages aren’t rising along with it, and the cost of living just keeps getting more expensive.”
“In a nutshell,” he added, “people can’t keep up no matter how hard they work.”
In a survey of registered voters, the institute found exactly the sorts of concerns you’d expect if you followed last year’s election — workers are feeling pinched by increasing costs and stagnant wages. The study found a strong majority of respondents have had to work more than one job at some point in their lives. A quarter of respondents have had to do so in the last two years.
Workers told researchers they’re ready for significant changes to the economy that would lower costs and increase wages. Nevertheless, they report optimism for their near-term futures.
“Workers keep telling us the status quo isn’t working for them and their families, but neither party — neither party — has an agenda to create the dramatic change that workers want and the dramatic change that workers are demanding,” Brown said.
There has been speculation that Brown might use the institute as a springboard for a future political campaign. But he insisted that’s not the case.
“This institute is not part of those plans, period,” he said, adding, “I don’t know what I’m going to do in the future.”
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