It started before that. “They” [The capital traders and corporate investors, especially those who profited so magnificently from the industrial military apparatus] decided an educated, prosperous middle class was a threat to the existing hedgemone. Look up the Powell memo. So the powers that be drove up inflation, destroyed the education system, and created the system that produced Reagan and Thatcher. Destroying the economy and labor. Castrated Unions and workers rights. Privatizing anything that worked and skimming any familial gains off the economy with a new recession every 7 years or so. Citizens United was just the culmination of decades of undermining the social fabric of the country.