By Michael D. Yates The year 2022 saw a significant increase in working-class unrest in the United States. Millions of workers quit their jobs in 2021, and this trend has continued in 2022. Most moved on to different employment, while others continued their education or retired. Recently, many Twitter employees quit in response to the severe force reduction … [Read more...] about Let’s push for a radical labor movement in 2023
workers
Double Deformation: Capital v. Nature & Humanity
Michael A. Lebowitz The exploitation of workers is at the core of capitalism. It explains capital’s drive to divide workers in order to grow. Exploitation is the source of the inequality characteristic of capitalism. To fight inequality, we must fight capitalist exploitation. However, inequality is only one aspect of capitalism. In and by itself, exploitation is inadequate … [Read more...] about Double Deformation: Capital v. Nature & Humanity
‘Essential workers’?
This article from Reveal (affiliated with the Center for Investigative Reporting) makes clear that forceful lobbying derailed provisions that would have reduced the death toll among health care workers. (And it would also have reduced the number of cases where they then passed it on to other patients) 31,000 and Counting How a Lobbying Campaign Pushed the CDC to Relax … [Read more...] about ‘Essential workers’?
Post-Job Societies
Robert Kocis I. The Problem – A spectre is haunting the industrial and post-industrial world — the spectre of job insecurity. While globalization explains some job insecurity (jobs have been shifted from the more- to the less-developed parts of the world), the greater threat emerges from artificial intelligence (AI), computerization, and robotization, which threaten jobs … [Read more...] about Post-Job Societies
Exploitation of the Powerless: The Essence of Capitalism
Philip Reiss My American Heritage Dictionary of The English Language defines a welfare state as "A social system whereby the state assumes primary responsibility for the welfare of citizens." This definition didn't say ALL citizens. So, it seems it's open for interpretation. Also, what is meant by social system? A definition of the term social system is not presented per se. … [Read more...] about Exploitation of the Powerless: The Essence of Capitalism
Notes from the Editors (Left Turn #2)
Left Turn is now published seasonally. On October 2, 2018, Amazon announced that it will implement a $15-an-hour across the board wage floor for all its 350,000 workers, including part-time and contract workers. It also announced a commitment to work to lift the national federal minimum wage (stuck at $7.25 per hour since 2009). It’s fair to say that pressure from … [Read more...] about Notes from the Editors (Left Turn #2)
What professors and Fast Food Workers Have In Common
Elizabeth Oram My father was a tenured professor at a large southern university. His income provided a secure, middle class life for our family of four in the 1960s. But my father was not brilliant or ambitious and I am certain that were he a PhD job seeker in today's academic "marketplace," our family would have known neither security nor abundance. He would have been among … [Read more...] about What professors and Fast Food Workers Have In Common