There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century

Economic woes due to postindustrial decline and automation have caused financial hardship for many. In addition, rising healthcare and education costs make people in the US and the UK feel like systems aren’t working. Beyond economic woes, people face other hardships, such as setbacks due to geographic location, gender, and sexual orientation; in the US in particular, racism impedes people of color. While the problems afflicting modern society can feel disparate and insurmountable, Hill identifies the common thread between them: social mobility.

The lack of social mobility sometimes causes and often exacerbates economic and social challenges: When people feel that their opportunities are threatened or shrinking, people feel trapped and are more likely to act on preexisting prejudices towards marginalized groups and seek a scapegoat to blame. Hill’s book connects these insular and antisocial tendencies with the 2016 US presidential election, in which “[v]oters had little to lose, and much to gain” (175) from electing Trump, a candidate who promised simple solutions to complex problems. The nihilistic desire to blow up a broken system is an attitude towards government that makes stagnation and decline so dangerous. Hill warns that if governments (local, state, and federal) don’t make serious overtures to understand their constituents and ensure they have the means to build better lives, then voters will turn to other populist candidates since “unhappiness eventually shows up as dissent at the ballot box” (181).

Often, when populists take power, they seek to become manipulative autocrats “who profess to have [citizens’] best interests at heart but in truth are only out for themselves” (351), like Putin, the President of the Russian Federation. While Hill’s book was written prior to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the event confirms her dramatic statement. Initially elected as a populist with a deeply nationalist vision for Russia and turning “the LGBTQ community and tiny political opposition parties or loose opposition movements that he dubbed ‘pro-Western, gift-column liberals’” (225) into scapegoats, Putin now holds an absolute grasp on power and information in the country and no one can oppose his militaristic whims or his narrative that the West has always been trying to stifle Russia’s greatness.

Hill argues that building equity means encouraging social mobility: People should have access to quality education, be able to relocate when necessary, and achieve success regardless of identity. Moreover, social immobility isn’t just a problem for the working and middle classes: “[A]s long as [the marginalized] feel there is no hope for them, there will be no hope for the rest of us. There will be nothing for us, anywhere” (356). While governments can promote social mobility through better infrastructure and resources, individuals can improve their communities by offering help to others—as happened to Hill whenever a mentor supported her. This can mean anything from offering a ride to someone who needs to go to an interview or creating youth mentoring programs—the important thing is using one’s privilege to buoy others. Ensuring the ability to improve circumstances for all will prevent the rise of populism and the consequent downfall of American democracy.