For much of America’s history, those who rose to the top reflected, at least in aspiration, the experiences and values of the wider society. But a new report, Them vs. U.S.: The Two Americas and How the Nation’s Elite Is Out of Touch with Average Americans, released by the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, an economic think-tank, suggests that era has ended.

The study, surveyed 1 000 self-identified members of the “elite” who earn over US$150 000, hold postgraduate degrees, and live in major metropolitan areas, alongside comparative polls of everyday American voters. The result is a portrait of a ruling class thriving in a system that increasingly serves its own interests and sensibilities, while drifting ever further from the lived reality of the country’s middle and working classes.

“Only about 20% of all Americans say they believe their finances are getting better now. But among the Elite, that number more than triples to 74%,” the report notes. The figure soars to 88% among Ivy League graduates.

With this security comes a startling cultural turn, a belief that Americans enjoy too much liberty. Nearly half (47%) of the elite say there is: “too much individual freedom” in America, and 55% of Ivy League graduates agree.

Among ordinary Americans, just 22% share this view, while the majority, 57%, believe the balance of freedom is about right, and another 21% think there is too little freedom.

That attitude is most evident in elite support for government intervention. Seventy-seven percent of elites favour: “the strict rationing of gas, meat, and electricity” to fight climate change. Sixty-three percent of all voters oppose such controls.

Here lies the core paradox: the class that benefits most from the status quo is also the class most eager to restrict everyone else’s choices. Imagining themselves as benevolent stewards of the nation, they call for rules and controls that land hardest on those not already comfortable.

History offers a warning about this dynamic. In pre-revolutionary France, a noble and priestly class lived in material comfort and moral certitude, crafting rules for others while insulated from ordinary life. Societies where the upper echelons become detached from those below seldom remain stable for long. When the class that shapes policy and culture no longer shares the risks and freedoms of its fellow citizens, pressure builds and eventually, the system strains and can break.