I have decided that I really do have to break with most of my fellow online Leftists and agree with Casual Historian that Neoliberalism isn't actually a thing. But it's not just a talking point of self described Socialists and Communist but also of Progressive Liberals, Centrist History YouTubers and even some online Conservatives.
Now it is true that the Republican and Democratic Parties are really just variations of the same basic Economic ideology, that ideology being Free Market Liberalism, no Neo prefix necessary, and they exist alongside various other variants.
The Neoliberalism narrative typically goes like this.
Milton Freidman developed the Chicago School of Economics in the 1970s and influenced the Economic Policies of Chilean Dictator Pinochet. Sometimes a claim that his ideology is just a slight modification of Ayn Rand's is thrown in.
Then in the 80s Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher applied Freidman's ideology in the U.S. and U.K. overthrowing the prior Keynesian status quo.
Finally in the 90s under Bill Clinton and Tony Blair the parties that were supposed to oppose those parties just caved and became just as Neoliberal and really still disagreeing with the other party only on Social Issues and sometimes maybe Foreign Policy.
I'm going to work backwards here, but I can only really comment on the U.S. since I don't have the lived experience of growing up in the U.K. during the 90s.
The core ideology of the mainstream Democratic Party is just as Keynesian as it ever was. The destruction of Cash Welfare during the Clinton Administration wasn't spearheaded by Clinton himself, it was a consequence of the Republicans taking control of the House under Newt Gingrich.
Since then the Democrats have never had enough control necessary to undo all the Reagan era damage. Even when controlling the White House and both Houses of Congress they've never had a Filibuster Proof Majority. The last Presidential Election to ever be a true landslide was 1984. We've been in a fairly perpetual stalemate for a Generation. In my opinion to deny the Obama administration was Keynesian is as absurd as denying he was an Born in Hawaii.
But another reason people fail to see Keynesianism in the modern Democratic Party is that some people waxing Nostalgic for the 50s have overstated just how Progressive Keynes actually was. He was not anywhere near the Social Democracy of Bernie Sanders, he didn't want Nationalization of Industries and he wasn't even as big a fan of Welfare and Unions as you probably assumed he was. If anything it might be possible to argue that modern Democrats are actually closer to Keynes then FDR or Kennedy were.
Now it is true thar Milton Freidman was an Influence on Reaganomics, he was an advisor to Reagan and other Republican leaders, but he wasn't their only advisor, regular old William F. Buckley style Conservatives were the far greater influence. And the U.S. Government becoming more fiscally Conservative actually started under Carter. Opposition to Social Programs and Government hand outs for the Poor had been a part of Burkean Conservatism since Edmund Burke himself in Thoughts and Details on Scarcity, Reagan didn't need the Chicago Boys to get the idea.
Milton Freidman wanted the Federal Reserve Abolished, Decriminalization of Drugs and Prostitution and no Minimum Wage. The last of those is indeed something Republicans want but simply aren't getting. But the Republican Party as a whole never even began to flirt with even mild criticism of The Federal Reserve until after Ron Paul made his big impact in the 2008 Election. And Friedman's opposition to the Federal Reserve was not some minor issue you can deem expendable, it was a core pillar of his ideology, as long as we still have the Fed you can't claim Freidman won.
Ron Paul was an outlier within the Republican Party, and even he wasn't a Chicago Schooler, he was an Austrian like Murry Rothbard. Milton Freidman hated both Rothbard and Ayn Rand, and Rand hated all Libertarians from either school.
Frankly I feel Neoliberalism discourse is parallel to the old Neoconservatism discourse I remember from my Ron Paul supporting youth. I've never seen anyone self describe as either Neoliberal or Neoconservative, and after watching some videos from a Trotskyist deconstructing the Trotskyism-Neoconservatism pipeline narrative I'm pretty sure it too isn't a real thing.
Neoconservatism was a boogeyman invented by Pacifist Conservatives to justify their denial that War Mongering has always been a part of the Conservative Tradition, but it has from William McKinley to how Joseph McCarthy became Senator. Likewise I think the Neoliberalism narrative began among Progressive Liberals who wanted to deny that the problems of the last 4 decades are innate to Market Economies. Then a bunch of those Liberals became Socialists after jumping on the Occupy Wallstreet or Bernie Sanders bandwagon and that's where Breadtube comes from.
I've also seen it suggested that Neoconservatism should maybe be considered an Antisemitic Dog Whistle, from the claimed Trotsky connection to the claimed Henry Kissinger connection to the sometimes claimed association with William F Buckley's Zionism. And the way they would often be depicted as behind the scenes manipulators "Neocons don't win elections, they attach themselves to winners" was a quote I remember.
And since it's Milton Freidman and Ayn Rand who's actual influence on the current status quo is being massively overstated, and a WASP Gentile who's continued influence is being denied, maybe Neoliberalism should be considered an Antisemitic Dog Whistle as well.
Update: Here's an interesting Twitter Conversation I had after sharing this.
Another Update: John Todd
John Todd was in the 70s a Right Wing Evangelical Christian Conspiracy Theorist, one of the first to claim to actually be a former member of the Illuminati who left, before Warnke or Schneoblen made that a trend. He specifically claimed that Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged was the Illuminati Blueprint for a Satanaic Take Over and even specifically predicted 1980 would be the year of that take over.
In other words the Neoliberalism Narrative actually claims the predictions of a 70s Conspiracy Theorist were essentially right, simply minus the accusing them of worshiping Satan.
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