Fan Question: The Source of Progessivism

Recently a fan emailed use for our opinion on a subject. Here is their question:

What do you think of this: Source of progressivism’s strength:
https://meinwords.wordpress.com/2016/01/02/source-of-progressivisms-strength/ 

If you click on the link you will see an interesting chart that shows how things used to be and how they are now. This is an attempt to explain how progessive ideology has become so strong today. I wanted to fill in a hole here so I said the following:

Thanks for the link. I think the question that needs to be asked that the article does not address completely is "why has there been a flip?" I may be misunderstanding the article (it's been a long day man). I think the reason there has been a flip is that the pseudo free markets of the industrial revolution and beyond and the division labor has created a surplus of capital and helped to raise the standard of living.
Economics shifted from agriculture to more specialized labor. With more specialized labor, the need for higher quality labor increased till we see the shift of children earning later in life.
I think a failed system like socialism and progressivism is only even considered when you have a higher standard of living and an excess of capital. We have seen this in Scandinavia in which they had highly capitalistic tendencies and later shifted to a heavy welfare state. It's the idea of "how do you get a small collection of wealth? You start with a large collection and dwindle it down." So the modern progressive philosophy rests on the shoulders the capitalist system it despises.
I hope that is a decent explanation of my perspective. Let me know if I'm totally off. Again, it's been a long day.

In short, progressivism is a bourgeois luxury. The person that emailed this to us had some further insights as well:

Yes, The Flip happened because of the reasons you said. More importantly, I think The Flip would have happened without the help of any political party or thinker. Much like how people migrated everywhere after the Ice Age without being forced to, people migrated from the old social order into the new one without anyone asking them to explicitly. Sure there were revolutions, and conspiracies planned by a few people to accelerate this change, but the overall trend towards progressive values is driven by changes in economic conditions.
The modern movement of progressivism rests on the shoulders of the system it despises. Free market capitalism. Not only that, but these socialists and collectivists that demonize the free market look at "the good old days", when people died of dysentery and 5 of your 12 kids were killed by being kicked by horse, with fondness. No thanks.

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