okay, so, to preface: the wehrbauer system was a project of settler-colonialism conducted by fascist germany against eastern europe, wherein, after the nazi war machine had rolled through, and the population had been eradicated through genocide, german 'soldier-builder' settlers would occupy the land and form a specific type of settlement: one where everyone was a small-business owner, mainly farmers and other small-producers, and maintained a small, local economy. this was desirable both because it alleviated the collapse of capitalist finance in germany, but also because these wehrbauers would act as a bulwark against communism - both physically, and economically. because they weren't proletarian, they were, rather, middle-class peasantry, they had personal stakes in maintaining the economy (due to their small business) and were less susceptible to revolutionary politics, as they were comfortable individuals operating in a market, rather than workers under exploitation. this was explicitly based on the project of settler-colonialism carried out in north america.
then, in the US and UK, notably postwar in the US, but in both especially during the neoliberal period, a strong push towards private home ownership was made for largely this same reason - siphoning off some of the superprofits of exploitation, to give workers, who could otherwise achieve some level of class solidarity, a personal stake in the capitalist system. a car and a picket fence was not only presented, ideologically, as the pinnacle of stability and safety, but was also pushed economically, through programs like right to buy, and through zoning and tax laws that incentivised the building of massive numbers of single-family houses that people could be pushed into. homeownership increased drastically under thatcher, and even workers who didn't get to own a house started to see themselves as temporarily embarrassed middle class homeowners - striving, as individuals, to achieve that dream of, essentially, getting the middle-class life and leaving the working class behind - rather than fighting for better conditions for the class they were actually a part of. this coincided with the destruction of welfare systems and public housing, very strongly cementing the movement towards 'give up your class consciousness, become an individual family in a suburb, else die'
in both cases the deprivation and destruction of one section of the global working class is used to dangle an economic incentive in front of the imperial core's working class. one that, if received, provides an economic basis to oppose progressive politics, and that, even for those who don't receive it, still completely atomises and fractures the working class
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