My take on Trump's supporters

[136 or 142]

Do the Trump supporters here agree with this?

I think the large majority of Trump voters are the middle aged working class whites (probably most white males as well) who are mainly voting on economic issues.  I think what has happened is this:

Working class whites shifted to the Republicans first under Nixon (actually in the deep south, first with Goldwater and then over to the independent George Wallce, but anyway.)  Nixon's strategy was called 'The Southern Strategy' but, I think it is more accurate to call it the 'working class whites strategy.'  The strategy came from a brilliant political and polling analyst named Kevin Phillips who never thought that it would only be the U.S South that would align with Nixon and the Republicans.  Nixon and then Ford, obviously because of Watergate and subsequently, Ford's pardon of Nixon, lost a lot of these new Republicans back to Jimmy Carter and the Democrats.

My guess is, is that had Jimmy Carter appointed Paul Volker as his first act as President and given him full authority to 'whip inflation now' and not waited until 1979, that inflation would have greatly diminished, the economy would have started to turn around, and even with the Iranian Hostage Crisis, Carter would have been reelected and he would have kept many of these working class whites in the Democratic Party for another generation.  (Obviously this part is pure speculation, but the rest isn't.)

The important thing here though is that Nixon's appeal to working class whites was based on social conservatism and not economic conservatism.  Nixon said "we are all Keynesian's now and while he may have reduced some social welfare spending (I actually don't know  he was the first President to propose what is now known as Obamacare and he also suggested the idea of implement a GAIN to replace all welfare spending (Guaranteed Annual Income.)  So, on social welfare policy he'd be as close to Bernie Sanders today as to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and completely on the opposite side of the Republican Party.  He also appointed Arthur Burns as Chair of the Federal Reserve who promoted an expansionist monetary policy.
However, Reagan was reelected with his 'Reaganomics'  (aka more or less, Monetarism, supply side economics and voodoo economics) and he reaped the benefit of Paul Volker's actions.  However, he also got most working class whites of his day to believe that it was his entire agenda of deregulation (started under Carter), slashing social services, tax cuts mainly for the wealthy, strong support for the independence of the  Federal Reserve and free trade that was responsible for 'Morning in America.' (and some of those things may also actually have contributed.)

However, Ronald Reagan was first elected 36 years ago, and for today's working class whites he is either a distant memory, if remembered at all, or hold his agenda partly responsible for the growing income inequality and their difficulty in general of being able to find secure and reasonably well paying work (though most don't hold Reagan personally responsible.)

So, Ronald Reagan was able to make hold together this largely unnatural alliance of working class whites and the 'country club' establishment. However, due almost entirely to the appalling greed of these country club establishment Republicans in taking virtually all of the gains in income from productivity increases for themselves, and also in switching the tax 'burden' so much from themselves to everybody else,  this coalition has mostly fallen apart, and the middle aged and, to the degree they exist, younger working class whites are largely anti establishment Trump supporters.

I hear this on radio shows in that a lot of the older working class whites are still largely pro free trade and still argue that wages need to be kept low in order to not see jobs shipped overseas, while a lot of the younger and middle aged working class types are almost entirely suspicious of free trade and, while still largely being anti union and believing wages shouldn't rise too much, they also are unhappy that their wages haven't risen much at all since they started working full time jobs (or whatever equivalent they can find).

I also hear at least some of these callers say that while they support Trump, in general, they really don't care for most wealthy people, which is completely the opposite of the Reagan era working class white population.

Edited to add:  Trump fits the positions of current working class white voters in that he is anti the free trade agreements that have been negotiated (though not opposed to free trade agreements that would only have provisions favorable to the U.S), he wants hire taxes on bankers, if not on all rich people as part of his way of reigning in the greed of the bankers and his vague promise to 'make America great again' may be read by his working class supporters that he wants to see rising wages for everybody (that's just speculation on my part.)  Finally, maybe most importantly as was pointed out by GravitySucks, he also has pretty much come out against nearly all immigration to stop the foreigners coming here and 'taking our jobs.'  On pretty much all of these issues, he is strongly opposed by the establishment 'country club' Republicans.  This may also explain partly why Trump goes after Jeb Bush the most as Jeb Bush is easily the most identified of all the Republican candidates as being part of the wealthy elite Republican establishment (or 'the haves and have mores.')

Trump's authoritarian stances and his tough talk on foreign policy (which is a complete change from his previous position of 'let Russia do it' in regards to ISIL may also be reasons for Trump's support, but I tend to favor the economic issues as the main reason.

[Jackstar]

These are interesting points, but I'm unclear that anyone here actually supports Trump. Myself, I'm certainly glad he's running, and I enjoy the consequences (thus far), but I don't see myself voting for him.

Who would? A good question.

[GravitySucks]

How can you mention Trump and leave out the primary reason for his success so far. He was the first candidate to bring up the issue of illegal immigration. If you want to know where the majority of his support comes from, it began there.

[136 or 142]

How can you mention Trump and leave out the primary reason for his success so far. He was the first candidate to bring up the issue of illegal immigration. If you want to know where the majority of his support comes from, it began there.

Yes, I wrote this several weeks ago on another board.  I meant to add in how Trump views align with white working class middle aged voters.

I'm going to edit the post right now.  Not sure if I would have mentioned the illegal immigration but that ties in with his opposition to the free trade agreements that have been negotiated which was going to be my major point.

[FearBoysWithBugs]

How can you mention Trump and leave out the primary reason for his success so far. He was the first candidate to bring up the issue of illegal immigration. If you want to know where the majority of his support comes from, it began there.

Maybe at a higher level, but his support is something more basic:

As predicted, Trump performed best among voters with a high-school education or lower.  [...] Voters who had any education beyond high school...mostly broke for Rubio and Cruz over Trump.

[source: http://www.businessinsider.com/why-donald-trump-lost-iowa-caucus-results-ted-cruz-2016-2]

That's really all you need to know.

[Designx]

A few points - I'm voting entirely for economic reasons and I fall in a more conservative position but I feel the "moral" right is destroying the party. Second, Paul Volcker is entirely responsible for the boom in the 80's, not Reagan's policies which more promoted greed than the middle class. Third, it's hard to really tell what a president does for an economy outside of choosing a fed chairman since economies run on long term generational patterns.  Certain things like women coming into the workplace and massive trade agreements have had large impacts on the economy.
Unfortunately Trump is the moderate choice this election which is where I usually fall when I vote. Kasich would be a better choice for me but he's going no where and his pandering to the religious right is annoying. Screw the religious right - they don't have the best interests in mind for the rest of the country.

[Zoo]

I all about the Berin!!!

But if he does not win the Democrat seat I am going to vote for Trump for sure.The real reason why I support those two people is simple. I do not trust Hillary, as well as I do not trust Jeb, Ted, Marcio, and Karish. Also I would like to see things change dramatically. It truly does not matter how good or bad it becomes I just want a dramatic change!!1