In what he termed a “labor aristocracy,” Eric Hobsbawm saw echoes of what Marx and Engels had described. Hobsbawm posited that the anti-socialist, “workerist” tradition of union politics in the United States and the UK may be reflective of a powerful, elite layer of workers in the two countries’ labor markets. These white, often Protestant, male workers were comparatively highly paid and benefited from their position in capitalist production. Their rather advantaged market position put them at odds with more precarious workers who were more likely to advance universalistic programs for political transformation. Above: Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, December 1920