Essential: How the Pandemic Transformed the Long Fight for Worker Justice (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781541619913)

How essential workers' fight for better jobs during the pandemic revolutionized US labor politics

Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, essential workers lashed out against low wages, long hours, and safety risks, attracting a level of support unseen in decades. This explosion of labor unrest seemed sudden to many. But Essential reveals that American workers had simmered in discontent long before their anger boiled over.

Decades of austerity, sociologist Jamie K. McCallum shows, have left frontline workers vulnerable to employer abuse, lacking government protections, and increasingly furious. Through firsthand research conducted as the pandemic unfolded, McCallum traces the evolution of workers' militancy, showing how their struggles for safer workplaces, better pay and health care, and the right to unionize have benefitted all Americans and spurred a radical new phase of the labor movement. This is essential reading for understanding the past, present, and future of the working class.

Author: Jamie K. McCallum
ISBN-10: 1541619919
ISBN-13: 9781541619913
Publisher: Basic Books
Language: English
Published: 11/15/2022
Pages: 320
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.15lbs
Size: 8.70h x 6.20w x 1.70d

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 09/19/2022
Shelf Awareness 12/16/2022