Perhaps the most incisive part of the essay (emphasis in the original):

"Let us assume that political scientists and pundits are correct when they claim that the majority of Americans vote on economics — primarily “pocketbook issues” like jobs and taxes. Since Jimmy Carter was elected President in 1976 — that’s 44 years, folks — the Democratic Party has been advocating major spending on infrastructure, almost along the lines of FDR-style “New Deal” programs. In the 12 years since the financial crisis — a period when the country desperately needed to create millions of jobs (on top of what emerged through the too small stimulus program) — the Republican Party had first obstructed Obama’s desire for more spending on infrastructure, preventing a jobs boom in the industries where most middle- and working-class folks ply their trades. Then in 2017 they gave corporations and American oligarchs a $1.5 trillion tax cut. Where is the frustrated Trump supporter’s outrage about that? When George W. Bush was President, massive tax cuts for the wealthy and tax loopholes for corporations became law, increasing income disparity and causing more shrinkage of the middle class. Where is the frustrated Trump supporter’s outrage about that? When the Neo-Cons and mainstream Republicans in the Bush administration pushed America into a devastating war in Iraq based on lies and deceit (that many Democrats like Clinton went along with, lest they be branded “traitors” ), the cost was losing the lives of thousands of young people — mainly from working class families — and trillions of dollars that could have been spent on infrastructure, education, health care, and the social safety net. Where is the frustrated Trump’s supporters outrage about that? When it was clear that a pandemic was upon us this past January and February, Donald Trump played golf and claimed the disease would all go away like magic. The upshot at this point? Almost 125,000 dead Americans and climbing, and the worst financial crisis since The Great Depression. Where is the frustrated Trump’s supporters’ outrage about that?"

So, clearly, the pundits are wrong in thinking the majority vote in their own economic self-interest, as I've come to realize over the last several decades. People follow a political party for the same reason they follow a religion or a sports team; for emotional and cultural reasons, because their family or friends follow it, because it appeals to them on a gut level. Complicated explanations of the changing world economic picture don't reach people's guts. Giving them someone to blame does.