Dems can't give them what they want which is for the Jerb Creators to come back. Even if we raise tariffs or subsidize production the whole thing has scaled up beyond Capitalism being interested in them much a-tall. We can't undo the technological progress that has rendered whole classes of employment nearly obsolete, either.
We can put money into their economies in a variety of ways but we'll have to tax the sacred Rich & employ big gubmint to do it. We'll subsidize small town hospitals, clinics, community centers, housing, schools & govt employment. We'll fix the roads & the infrastructure & hire them to do it & maintain it. We'll put money into all the forgotten corners of America but we won't have the money as long as people vote for tax cutting Republicans.
We should raise capital gains taxes to match income taxes, and we should also bring tax rates back in line with they were in the 50s and 60s during the biggest growth of the middle class this country has ever seen. (I'm talking 90% marginal rate for the top bracket, none of this watered down 70% business.)
We can't "un-automate" things, that is true, but, there is a LOT that could be done to bring some jobs back to the US which have been lost to overseas.
Furthermore, to ensure a fair open market and to ensure the politicians are serving the people (by that I mean fleshy people, not so called corporate person nonpersons), we need to break up monopolies, break up companies that collude with anticompetitive behavior or price fixing, and forbid all forms of political bribery. All political campaigns should be 100% publicly financed.
Look at media companies for example, used to be hundreds of independent news papers, radio stations, tv stations, now just a handful of conglomerates. This makes it a LOT harder to start up a new business if you are competing against deep pockets and infinite corruption.
Look at food, there used to be thousands of independent butchers, meat packers, mills, food processors, and various other businesses. Now a handful of companies control most of the farms and most of the food production across the whole country.
We also need to encourage companies who are in the US to stay in the US and to invest more in hiring in the US. Automation has killed a lot of jobs, but, also has allowed many factories to run efficiently and compete against cheaper foreign labor.
And Jhhnhn, just like you said, we need to invest heavily into the communities directly.
We need politicians who will stick their neck out to do their job. We need politicans to stop with the platitudes! We need them to stake their careers on "we are going to hire XXX people in the XXX region for XXX per month to do XXX job." Spell it all out in the campaign, so that if they fail to deliver, we can vote them out of office and get somebody in who will fight harder.