Gaetano Inglese

Essays on the Politics of Unmet Expectations

My thesis examines how deteriorating economic expectations shape political behaviour, with particular attention to young and highly educated citizens in advanced capitalist democracies. Moving beyond classical models of material self-interest, my work highlights the relevance of future expectations, and it explores what happens when expectations fail to materialize. My thesis zooms into three structural transformations: (1) declining income returns to education, (2) the labour-market impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI), and (3) the growing unaffordability of housing. It argues that the growing gap between expectations and reality generates perceptions of insecurity and systemic unfairness, eroding belief in meritocratic principles and fostering resentment against mainstream politics.

From Aspiration to Disillusion? The Political Consequences of AI-driven Employment Threats

The expansion of higher education in knowledge economies has fostered the belief that investment in education brings economic rewards and enhances security. However, the fast-growing advancements in Artificial Intelligence are transforming highly skilled sectors, fuelling perceptions of risk and uncertainty among highly educated workers. What are the political implications of this new trend? This paper examines whether AI-driven threats to graduates' employability erode their faith in the meritocratic system, leading to shifts in economic preferences and voting intentions. The paper builds on a dataset linking individual-level surveys and administrative data on online job vacancies in the United Kingdom with novel indices of occupational exposure to AI. Leveraging the introduction of ChatGPT in December 2022, the paper demonstrates how AI causally affects the employability of graduates across different fields of higher education. Negative shifts alter individuals' fairness beliefs, shift ideological self-placement to the left and drive anti-incumbent voting intentions. The study importantly underscores how AI is likely to influence the political views and behaviours of the young and highly educated, suggesting important and long-lasting political repercussions for the politics of knowledge economies.

• Green, J., Grant, Z., Evans, G. and Inglese, G. (2025), “Linking artificial intelligence job exposure to expectations: Understanding AI losers, winners, and their political preferences”, Research & Politics, 12(2).
• Green, J. Evans, G. Grant, Z. Inglese, G. and Seibert, L. (2025), “Mid-Life Economic Crisis: The Electoral and Policy Importance of Economic Insecurity among Middle-Aged Adults”. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

• Professor Sara Hobolt
• Professor Chris Anderson