I have this conspiracy theory that the modern rejection of the educated working class (professionals, college professors, scientists) by the conservative working poor was orchestrated by the educated rich to reassert the value of a college degree as a class signifier. College degrees have generally gotten less valuable as more people earn them, but nobody has lost as much utility from them as the rich, who have gone from using them as a shibboleth of their class status to being publicly humiliated for their poor academic performance. Creating an artificial divide between the rich who "deserve" their degrees and use them "properly", and the poor, who are merely out-of-touch ivory tower elitists, makes their degrees valuable again, and discourages more poor people from trying to elevate themselves.
Sort of like how conservatives talk about how we shouldn't worry about police killing black people until black people stop killing black people, but they don't do anything about that, either.