Nearly a billion people have been pulled out of poverty in India and China over the last 25 years. Their wages have at least tripled on average in real terms in the last 20 years. So, it's you who's burying your head in the "America first" sand.

The middle class in the US had enjoyed the fruits of global inequality resulting from colonialism and WW2 during the second half of the 20th century.

As the gap in skills and education between the average American and the rest of the world have disappeared, the former US middle class will see their income gap with the rest of the world also disappear. A teacher, factory worker or a store clerk in the US isn't 20x more productive than a teacher, factory worker or a store clerk in India or China and there's not reason for that wage gap to exist any more.

Yeah, but things might not go swimmingly. We will see violence, protectionism, plain old isolationism rise.

The developed countries are still developed and their citizens will fight back.

Are you really sitting here and telling me that people merely being brought out of destitution is progress? We have far different views on progress.

I am not entirely sure if you are trolling. People being brought out of destitution is progress, absolutely.

It's the very first and most important step of progress. If people don't have enough to eat, even their brain won't develop properly. The lower layers of Maslow hierarchy are absolutely essential.

After that, more progress is needed, but having food, essential health and physical security is definitely the fundamental thing for any other types of progress, such as education.