You. When i think about this book i see it as having three major parts, after you introduce a situation now, you do a really good job of talking about through stories how workers struggled, they themselves built the middle class in this country to a great extent by organizing, by striking, bargaining through a lot of adversity and demanding more from policy changes and then you go through a lot of the hard times of what i call the reagan era which we are still in Work Companies and starting with the president of the United States really attacked workers a lot and their unions and then you tell a lot of hopeful stories about different creative and innovative ways that workers have been organizing and unions and other forms and make policy recommendations and one thing i have to say, a lot of books like this are criticized because they come up short on the policy recommendation but i hope we really get into that because you made quite a few interesting suggestions on what might be done to restore the voice and power of workers in this country. Why dont you start by laying out where you see things right now, what is the status of working people in this country and their ability to shape their own lives at work. I cover and labor work place for 19 years, one of my concerns people all over the nation, so many people had no idea what unions are, what unions do and how unions break bring us the 40 hour workweek and pensions in the Bumper Sticker the folks at broadus the weekend. I wanted to explain to people, unions have achieved a whole lot in American History but now theyre in decline and they have been taken on the chin. As a result, things are considerably worse for workers i believe is the case 30 or 40 years ago. I think far too few americans realize that American Workers have it bad in many ways compared with workers and other industrial nations. On very basic things, were the only industrial nation that does not have a law guaranteed paper until, paid maternal leave were the only one that does not guarantee all workers paid vacation in the 28 nations of the european union, all workers are guaranteed for weeks paid vacation in inference six week period and for decades, American Workers have been suffering terrible wage stagnation while corporate profits have reached record levels. I think a lot of workers get in their guts that something is broken and then there very frustrated and in my book i try to explain why things have headed south for workers in many ways. I say worker power in the United States is arguably the weakest and has been in decades. The percentage of workers are in unions, that is down from one and three when unions were at their peak. And certainly unions have some faults but despite the faults, unions have played a key role in building the middle class and helping give workers a voice whether on job safety or pension or on stopping bullying by buses and unions have played a key role in washington on enacting medicare and Social Security more generous but in recent years, unions have been on the defensive and Corporate Power has really trumped union power in many ways so i think we as a nation have to figure out a way to give workers more power to help create a fair nation, to help in stagnation. For example we have not raised the settlement wage and over a decade, that the longest time in American History the minimum wage has not been increased. I submit and argue that is because workers have so it is so weak in congress there unable to persuade lots of members of congress two ways them minimum wage and its hard for millions of americans to live on 725 an hour, the federal minimum wage. One of the keys in the book is to educate leaders about the problems workers have and look at strategies to try to increase power for workers to help create a more prosperous nation for millions of americans and millions of workers. What i think to a certain extent, a lot of people do not realize how few rights that they have, one of your suggestions is that we might go away from our Current System in almost all states except montana in which workers can be fired as the judge said many years ago, a good reason, bad reason or no reason at all, basically you have no right to your job in this country and you suggest going towards a just because system because workers can be fired if they did something wrong or not just because the boss does not like who youre going out with. Literally they can fire you for that. In most workers do not think that can happen to them until it does. Sometimes as a reporter i get a phone call from someone out of the blue saying my boyfriend got fired yesterday at work because he came in two minutes late or because his boss was angry about his attitude or he was not smiling and they say isnt that illegal and i say dont you understand the United States has unemployment which means they can fire you for any reason or no reason except specifically illegal people dont realize that their jobs can be very precarious, very uncertain into my mind one of the big problems in america is that workers do not have enough power, theyre scared to exercise their voice at work, i write about the Upper Big Branch mining dues and go to disaster where the workers were killed and they knew about the dangers in the mind but they were so scared of speaking up that they did not dig about the dangerous gas that was filling the mind and the mind exploded in all these workers died. Worker workers are way too scared to speak up so some people argue that we should move from an at will employment to a just cause so workers can be only fired for a legitimate reason and adjust because system would make workers more willing to speak up and say when they cced to problems or when their counting Sexual Harassment on the job. The other issue you mentioned raising the minimum wage, it is unbelievable that weve gone this long in this country without a raise in the minimum wage and as you know, the house we passed the rees the wage act which would raise the minimum wage in the United States to 15 an hour by 2025. Gradually over the next five years or so and we would in the practice of having subminimum wages for tip workers who are disproportionately women and people of color and taken advantage of and that would put millions and millions of dollars into poor peoples pockets, working peoples pockets and workers, i think your point, have not had the power in our politics, in washington and the state capitals to just get a decent shake in the United States in recent years. One thing that kills me, i read editorial pages and business lobbyists complain about big labor and unions are so extraordinarily powerful. And i looked up, who is really powerful, who is really big and i saw in 201522016 Campaign Cycle business gave more than 3. 4 billion in donations which was more than 16 times as much as unions which gave 213 million according to a respected nonpartisan group. Each year in Washington Corporation spend just under 3 billion on lobbying which is more than 60 times much as unions which spend 48. That explains a lot of the problems we see in washington. So to me it was weird that congress rushed to enact a 1 trillion Corporate Tax cut for business when corporations were already making profits and wall street was at record levels. How far can they go this income and wealth inequality how extreme will he get for we go in a different direction. Absolutely. And that explains why too many folks in congress, the senate is doing nothing to raise the minimum wage because they listen to their corporate donors. I want to talk a lot about the policy ideas, i just want to emphasize to our viewers that i got so much out of this book from your stories and i think its a great part of the book, the bulk of the book is telling stories and workers today but also throughout american myste mystery, i want to ask you, dont you think a lot of the stories that you tell from 100 years ago say, i have a lot of relevance to today so why dont you talk a little bit about the uprising of the 20000. Tell us about the story because i thought that had a lot of relevance to a lot of the struggles that workers go through today and even a lot of issues that people would think that is actually not about work the issues about immigrant rights and the rights of people in color in society, the minority group. Shirt happy to. I let around out labor history, its been a character who has fascinated me over the years, she was born in the ukraine, she was jewish, her father was very religious, she worked a lot of people and relatives have moved to new york, she would write letters to them because she was very literate, she her family moved to new york from ukraine and shes a very bright young lady, shes hoping to be a doctor someday but when she arrived in new york, she only spoke edition, she did not have a high school education. So what did she do she worked in a sweatshop. She was appalled she were from 7 00 a. M. To 7 00 p. M. And she would go into work before the sun came up and leave work after. In six or seven days a week. Yes and some of the bosses would sexually harass the women, sometimes they have to pay, they would be rushed not to be in the bathroom for more than a minute or two they often had to pay for the needle and thread at work and sometimes they would have to pay 5 cents to use Drinking Water when their only making 5 a week. She thought this was appalling and she became an activist and said im not going to take this. This young woman in her late teens, early 20s became the most prominent garment worker activist and people got fed up and started going on strike and there was long strikes at one or two garment factories in the decision that theres a huge meeting saying should we have permit workers to try to put not so much pressure on the factories and there is a big debate, the founder of the federation of labor was deciding over the meeting and he was temporizing, i dont know if we should have a strike, i dont know if women workers are dedicated enough to their jobs and he stood up and said at 23 years old, i think it is time to call the general strike, im tired of being a poor working woman struggling day after day and the place went bonkers and bananas and everybody stood up and that was the largest strike to date by women in American History. Even to this day . To this day, not calling for a 40 hour workweek at 52 hour workweek. We have a lot of young people this seems to think the 40 hour workweek was handed down by god. I explained no, it was one by struggle, thousands of millions of workers that were in the union. In the uprising of 20000, the strike that left two months in the dead of winter, in new york, a lot of these women jewish and italian immigrants, their families went hungry for many weeks but after two months they won the 50 hour workweek dented 56 hours, and no longer had to pay for needle and thread and out of most of the factories they won the right to join the union and of union recognition. One of the very few was a shirtwaist factory, two years later there was a horrendous tragedy where 146 workers died in a triangle fire. Here you have a story of a teenager and a woman in her 20s, many of the workers were teenagers or very young, overwhelmingly women, overwhelmingly immigrants, they did not speak english, they spoke italian, you engine and they were despised by the high society even the high Society Women came to their aid. In general, you dont have time to tell the details but they were beaten up. Summer beaten up physically by men, sent in by their employers so my question to you is, today when we have these inspiring movements that we should stop mass incarceration, black lives matter, immigrant lives matter, that the docket kids are saying we demand our rights and by the way the rights of other undocumented people. In the young people are out here in the movement about climate change. When i read your account, i thought how inspiring for young people in activist today who are fighting for rights in this country, i dont think in their mind they think a better look to the early 19th Century Labor Movement for inspiration. What i have seen from the book, people working collectively to lift themselves up to improve their wages and improve the climate and help with her treatment of africanamericans, i also stressed the agency is very important. Individuals need to stick their net out and stand up and try to demand justice like clara in the uprising of 20000. I thought it was crazy, at one time they beat her up and took 11 of her ribs,. How many ribs do you even have. Thats a lot. She did not want to tell her parents because she thought they would not let her go out and speak on soapboxes and lead strikes. So also there is incidents literally in papers like the new york tribune, i explained that the thugs, goons were coming to suck the jesus out of these women. And the police would come and arrest these women and let the thugs go, the police were so onesided and it shows how the establishment, the police, courts were so aligned against the workers. But even despite that, the workers were able to win the strike and in the book i read about who use their agency to fight for better advice, i write about a fast food worker in kansas city named terrence wise, he helped to fulltime cost to food jobs, and he left for work at six in the morning, he come back at midnight, he had three daughters and he would leave home before and returned home after second job and he complained and she complained to work so hard to make ends meet, he does not see his daughters most of the week. For a while they became homeless with some of the hours in his job were cut off and it was crazy that someone who is busting, working two fulltime jobs can hardly make ends meet. And he became an activist in the fight for 15 and the leaders and as i explained in the book, i was the very first journalist in the United States to write about the fight of 15. When he began seven years ago and the workers were demanding more from 15 an hour, i said that is super ambitious cool without pieinthesky, here we are seven years later, new york, california, illinois, maryland, connecticut, massachusetts, district of columbia have enacted the 15 minimum wage. It shows when workers are willing to stand up, when individuals are willing to stick their neck out, they can achieve big change in a lot of the lessons of todays activist, whether crime activist or black lives matter activist were made to womens activists, they learn a lot from the Labor Movement. The layer movement of appraising the 20000 in your home state and in michigan, when workers stand up and come together, they can achieve historical change. We saw that recently in my chapter on the teacher strikes in West Virginia and oklahoma and arizona and more recently in los angeles and chicago in the teachers were tired of being beaten down and were tired of the sturdy and we have to do something to increase or pay but to ensure that the schools are getting the funny that they need and it does not chastise and they do not balloon and we have money to buy modern textbooks. The teacher strikes have sent a message to the nation about how worker power can help build a fair nation. Lets talk about strikes as a mechanism. Because they were very important in building the middle class in this country in a fallen into disuse. Talk to us, you share both information and stories in the book, how many strikes there were in the 50s, 60s, 70s, how because both because of law and weakness in labor perhaps have fallen into near complete disuse until is what your thoughts are when youre starting to see teachers, hotel workers, auto workers at gm recently, right now my kid is on strike as a graduate employee not harvard. He is a ta and they are on strike. Telesis sweep, the role and history and how do you see Going Forward . In 1940, 50s, 60s, 70s there are far more strikes than they are today. In the 1970s there are 300 large strikes a year. And it was really only about 13 far far far left. Workers have become intimidated and i think a lot happened in the night 80s, the 50s and 60s there is fairly good cooperation between employers and unions. After world war ii at the nations economy growing and they gave fairly generous contracts income the 1980s the United States felt pressure from globalization and imports of Japanese Cars and imports of steel from elsewhere and imports of clothing, tvs and radios and a recession in 1980s. Those two things put unions on the pressure and made employers boulder about confronting unions and demanding more from concessions. So shortly after he became president in 1981, Traffic Controllers went on strike demanding more from large wage increase in a fourday week at her workweek. And for reagan as i explained it was a make my day moment, he said i will not put up with the legal strike and even though he had been president to lend the fruit first strike, he was tough towards unions and try to show he will not let labor push him around. I explained to the book, the air Traffic Controllers union mishandled the strikes, they did not Work Together to get enough public support or support from their fellow unions. They were cooperative and that was a major setback for unions across the nation that discouraged inviting them from going on strike. At the same time the air Traffic Controller is in bold and Corporate America to get much tougher towards the union. We saw major decline in strikes and also we saw corporations getting much tougher whenever the Unionization Efforts that made it much harder to unionize thats a big reason percentage of workers in unions is because its half of what it was in the 1980s, corporations engaged in so many sophisticated tactics to prevent workers from getting unions, they for people who support them and they often spy on workers who support them, they threaten to close their plans as ill explain in detail if workers vote to form a union. As i said, the number of strikes has fallen to the lowest level in more than half a century but last year something happened, i turned in a manuscript on february 19, 2018 and it was a quite time for unions, a very few strikes in the fight for 15 was only major thing going on in three days later as i explained there was a volcanic explosion in West Virginia where thousands of teachers wearing red shirts went on strike in West Virginia into charleston. It explained how the two teachers, an english teacher in a spanish teacher, those two people got the ball rolling for the huge strike. Without the leadership of the union right . Yeah, they West Virginia and teaches unions are not allowed to bargain collectively with their districts, they have to beg the state legislature. The laws against them. Yes to give them raises. It was a very conservative legislature that was cutting Corporate Taxes and cutting taxes to the rich and that created a freeze in the education budget statewide in a freeze on future salaries and the teacher saw the governor of West Virginia who is the richest man in West Virginia, the only billionaire in West Virginia, he said i will give you a raise of 1 a year for five years. The governor said we are going to give you a tiny raise into the Facebook Page exploded into thousands of teachers joined and all of a sudden had a big movement. People were fed up. It was like we are fed up and we are not going to take it anymore and it was like a fish tank. The heat was going up and getting worse and they were moving backwards economically because they were not getting raises and they saw these tax cuts for the rich. We are not going to tolerate this anymore. They wanted a raise and they one the ability enforced the governor to pay more attention to the education budget. Teachers followed suit and multiple other states and that would surprise many of the viewers where the unions are supposed to be weak. Oklahoma one of the reddest states in the union. Guest they were watching what the teachers were doing in West Virginia and was a huge strike they got on the phone and learned some lessons there and this happened in los angeles later in chicago. The system is broken. The government isnt spending enough on our schools. We really, you know, our kids are falling behind, class sizes are getting bigger. We have obsolete textbooks and teachers went on strike to fight for the wages for themselves and for a Better School system and they say we are fighting not just for ourselves, we are fighting for the community. And the gm strike there is one, theres interesting aspects that a district began, the unions chief negotiator said this isnt for us, it is for all americans. Explain that. You are also concerned about factories moving overseas. So are we. They were very unhappy about this huge factory in ohio closing and thousands of workers losing their jobs and gm said we have to close the plant because the demand for a car that is made there, the chevy cruz is declining, to close the plant but its kept open a plant in mexico. We want to try to stop jobs from moving overseas. They also said you are concerned about the future of jobs for your kids and grandkids and so are we. General motors one of the biggest iconic 7 of the workers at gm made 15 an hour and said weve got to fix this. They are not making more than mcdonalds workers and that is unfair. I can tell you how many times, the strike lasted more than 40 days including after they were voting on it until they finally went back to work and i cant tell you how many of the different wines i was on where i would talk to the senior people and i said what are you really out here for hi and so my of them said i am out here for the town. They havent had a raise in a long time. They had a lot of thei left then concerns, but they felt it was so just that they were working next to somebody making half of what they were and wa it was corrosive to the workplace if they wanted to and the whole idea and they succeeded tremendously so it was a fight for the working class in the country, not just for themselves and it was inspirational. I could tell you something, i dont think that this got enough attention not one person cross the picket line, 49,000 workers. Guest think about the society where people say our society is so divided into 80, b. And c. Ways. Everybody is on their smartphones not paying attention to each other come here almost 50,000 workers stuck together for over a month and they one change. I dont think we appreciate that human solidarity anymore but thats what it takes to make a change. Guest that is a great point and i think that a lot of workers are frustrated and tired of wage stagnation and gm and many other companies where they hire younger workers. A lot of people feel the system is rigged and thats one of the reasons they voted for donald trump. Guest unfortunately he had done many things against the workers and dressed, he did nothing to raise the minimum wage and holdback increased protection for the workers and safety protection. President obama took an important step to require them to act in the workers best interest in handling the 401 k . That policy was scrapped in the fiduciary rule. Many of them turned for the very same reason a lot of workers are looking to the unions and i think that is why right now but General Motors strikers had such support. One of the things they found that public approval of the union is at its highest the highest level as young americans, 67 of them and and e is a recentheres a recent stude professors that found that one, basically one into say they would vote to join the union tomorrow they could wear as just one in 16 privatesector workers within the union, theres a crazy disconnect they want to join but only 6 of them are unions and i would argue and explain in thexplained in the cd verse how they fight so hard to prevent workers from forming unions. The corporations fear they will share more of the profits there is too much income inequality. The labor unions are the most important effect of the vehicles to try to reduce the income inequality and i think that is a big reason why public approval for the unions is increasing, and i say that i finished the movie the irishman yesterday and corruption has been a problem. They did discriminate against African Americans and we didnt encourage the women workers enough, but i think that has changed and there is much less corruption and the legacy of discrimination thats way behind the unions that are the key part of the future of the american workforce. Itits women and workers of colr and unions saying we bow for everyone, we fight and i explain in the book that unions probably have done more than any other in society except perhaps the wonderful military to bring the workers of different races and religions together. Before i really am eager to leave enough time for policy. I want to ask you to pick out a few of those. For example. They used the agreement structure pioneered by lane. I got to march on the picket line on the frontier strike, the longest strike where nobody crossed the picket line in over six years or Something Like that, in las vegas, and you explained i think in some effectively held the union has an incredible model of empowering and organizing workers, many immigrant workers who you know, hhotel, housekeeper has a middleclass life. We brought people into the movement and i think that you pull the threads together in various places about the importance of young people organizing. Graduate employees organizing in different universities its been an area of growth for the Labor Movement comes to talk about one or two of the stories of the innovation that you have seen workers creating that you think could be promising models to gain more voice and power in the economys Going Forward. Guest i devoted a chapter to those in las vegas representing dishwashers and assistant cooks is in a lot of ways they were the model union that has done a good job of people that are usually lowwage workers lifting them into the middle class and building a powerful union that has done a ton of politics, and i profiled a Hotel Housekeeper and immigrant worker that works at the mgm grand who makes 19,051 cents an hour and under the contract she gets 40 hours a week. That makes 780 a weekend about 40,000 a year. I visited her apartment. Shes raised them on her own, her husband host and the tremendous health care. Guest she doesnt pay premiums, doesnt need medicaid, food stamps or welfare. I describe this example to show what a really good Effective Union can do to lift people into the middle class and in comparison and contrast the typical nonunion hotel worker in the nation, they have 11 an hour according to the bureau of labor statistics and often dont work 40 hours a week, maybe a 30 hour weeks at his 330 a week. You cant raise a family, three kids on 17,000 a year. You can hardly raise your self on back. So, the union is a good example of what the unions can achieve. Also wisconsin, pennsylvania, michigan, the strongholds have all blue to red and i explain about how the powerful Effective Union that does a great job communicating with its members and mobilizing them to get involved to make phone calls and knock on doors that played a key role in floating nevada from red to blue and i quoted the president of the union saying maybe they are strong in wisconsin, ohio, michigan, if they do what we do, communicating with the workers, educating them about the economy and what is going on in politi politics, unions in those states can do what we did in nevada. Francis rosia she fled honduras because of the hurricane there and move to the United States and is fighting very hard for lifting other workers and lifting herself and raising her children and i think that this is a great example. Guest it seems that it has incredible implications both for policies and for the Labor Movement itself, because you know, if we didnt have to subsidize workers say in another Hotel Company and all around the country where workers are making policy wages in walmart or other sectors where the vast majority are nonunion, and we, the taxpayers are paying for food stamps, temporary assistance for needy families, or so many other forms, so many other forms of public assistance if they were able to form their own unions they could take care of themselves, then theres the implications you talk about in the book for the Labor Movement where you think they need to devote more money to organizing. Welcome here is the union that did that or they need to empower their own workers to take care of themselves instead of picking up the phone to call the union staff. For the Labor Movement itself and for the policy. Guest thereve bee been a lt of studies done showing a High Percentage of walmart workers and Amazon Warehouse workers and food stamps and the pressure amazon to adopt the minimum wage so it is true all these workers that worked really hard still unfortunately need federal food stamps and other assistance. Now the union i wrote about several aspects but it does a great job in improving increasing the wages and many dont do a good enough job involving a member. One of the points i make big highprofile this house member not only does she work fulltime cleaning rooms, not only does she raised three kids on her own, she volunteers for the unions, she goes to bat for the coworkers who gets maybe punished for arriving five minutes late or have a hard time finishing their 14 rooms in the allotted eight hours and this is a union where people fight for each other but they have each others backs. And its a model because this union does a bout of organizing and many have gone on from having 18,000 members in the 1980s to 60,000 members and now it is more than triple in size. Overall its declined by nearly one third. So i would recommend folks read my chapter in the Culinary Union. It shows what the union can achieve when it does everything right. Host i need to mention one other aspect of the story, because i think that i am the only member of congress that used to run a state workforce system. You in the book talk about one innovation might be having states administer Unemployment Insurance but also possibly be involved in job Training Programs at helping workers access it. Talk about how theyve gone far beyond helping them access job training but the end players into thm. Players andthe union f the most inspiring a job Training Systems in america so that you can come in as somebody with no training and start cleaning hotel rooms and rise to become a major they working making 90,000 a year or something. Talk about their training because that is a worthwhile part of the story. Guest absolutely. Some of them do a great job training they have wonderful apprenticeships, not everyone is going to go to college. People see a great group to become a plumbing apprentice or carpenter, electrician apprentice and people pursue these apprenticeships and give jobs to be 70, 80, 90,000 a year. The Culinary Union working with the Hotel Casinos ha have a wonderful training academies with someone who was a could take courses to become waiters or bartenders and really double their salary to 50, 60,000 a year into the courses or for free. Then if they really want to begin take the courses to become somali aides, chefs and triple their salary and its a winwin. The Hotel Casinos in las vegas need a talented, loyal, knowledgeable workforce and they are eager to make more money and work in more skilled jobs so there is this cooperative effo effort. As they are making not much more than the minimum wage and 50, 60 to 70,000 a year i attended some classes at the academy. I attended a class with an amazing pastry chef teaching housekeepers how to become pastry chefs and its great for the industry, great for the workers at a society when there are these cooperative efforts to provide industry with the skilled workers they need to lift workers that are eager to move up in the world. Host lets talk more broadly about this because youve mentioned policy and how we can help the workers in the Country Access this kind of life. You mentioned the building trade, and they have incredible apprenticeships could. Theres this thing where everybody should go to college and not everybody has the model of the future economy where they can show if we need more than 50, 60 of the workforce to go to four year college. We are always going to need what you might call these little skilled jobs that really require more than high school but less than a four year degree that are a ticket to the middle class. I dont think most people know that if you sign on to become an iron worker or a labor operating engineer coming electrician, plumber, bricklayer, all the different trades you get education and work, you become a master at your content you are offered lifelong education just like a doctor or a lawyer you go back to learn about installing solar panels and electric vehicle charging station for example. And the benefits are affordable because if youre a construction worker lets say, you will build one building for six weeks or six months and then go to another one. How can we get this kind of middleclass life because people look and say why isnt everybody happy that you told the story in the fight for 15 chapter because all those people have a job, they had two or three jobs and they still didnt have a middleclass life. What are your top picks so that more American Workers can have a real middleclass life which is all we really want. Guest i was a reporter for 31 years, for five years based in paris as the nations times European Economic correspondent. I wrote about companies and workers in germany, italy, france, spain and the netherlands and sweden and england. Unfortunately, a lot of the folks i spoke to would say they may say they have this term the many jobs of the United States with a minimum wage without benefit of a codification. And they would sneer at the low level jobs in the United States and say it is the low road economy. There was a story about denmark the averaged 20 an hou 20 houe great benefits and get lots of vacations each year whereas workers averaged 8 an hour and didnt have Health Coverage and didnt get education. I think something was broken in the United States. That is one of the main points in the book is too often they have a lot more economy with low wages and no benefits and it makes it hard for the workers to make ends meet to support their families and it makes it very hard for the families work balance, so we have to figure out ways to improve things for workers. In th the book i look at various models and strategies to make things better for the workers. And i said one way is i think our Campaign Finance system is very broken. Corporations are far outspending unions and workers groups and that is why it stuck and theres a huge attack on the Health Coverage for all and we have to fix the campaignfinance systemm so it isnt dominated by the rich are the coke brothers network. Theres something wrong when someone could get 100 million to have a huge voice in the campaign and have much more than a schoolteacher corners or steelworker. Host thats something we need to do. Im going to push you to do rapid fire. In the house we passed hr one, which for example would help Public Financing for campaigns people gave up the 200, but it would be matched 61. Some states and cities have done it, so thats one. Let me ask you, i counted 17 proposals and i would say for or five of them are covered by what they are working through protecting the right to organize or the act we passed through the education and Labor Committee which i am the vice chair of. We have a disconnect for basically one into nonunion workers that say they want to join but only one in 16 are in the union. So the main reason its been picked up saying corporations fight harder to beat back the squash unions and corporations in any other country and they spy on workers infamous the things the corporations that break the law to keep out the unions, they say no punishment whatsoever. It also takes years to win back the jobs of the workers fired for reporting a union and they are given about something is broken when they can flagrantly and repeatedly break the law and only have their wrist slapped. So you need much stricter penalties to discourage the companies from doing that. And i think another problem is that workers only bargain one workplace at a time whereas in europe it gives much more clout when they bargain with an industry and i think we have to figure out a way in society because the corporations are so dominating the have to figure out a way to give more power. Here in new york city where i am there are tens of thousands of drivers and they cant unionize because there is considered independent contractors, but they find 95 of the drivers make less than the minimum wage. They have all these drivers driving 60 to 70 hours a week sometimes falling asleep at the wheel doing dangerous things, so the city enacted a law that creates the minimum paid to my minimum compensation for the drivers 17. 22 per hour. They are saying something is really broken for tens of thousands of workers and we want to do what is fair for the industry into the drivers to help ensure that they can make a decent living and not have to work 70 hours a week and fall asleep at the wheel. Host one of the thing thinge worked as ayouwould does an effd getting is showing there is aged of the individual, theres the solidarity of the groups of workers coming together and often thousands of teachers across the state, whatever the examples are and vendors a role of policy and we are not different from europe because god ordained it was the invisible hand. The states and cities make policies that cause these things. To wrap up, you think theres hope for their workers in america and if so, why because we have about a minute left and i want you to leave us on an up note because i feel your book gave me hope. Guest i think, you know, im feeling more hope than just a few years ago thereve been strikes workers are showing they are fed up and want better approval. Even donald trump is calling for paid family leave, something republicans have opposed for years and years and the workers are standing up, graduate student unions in my profession, unions are, so i think there is a sense that something is broken in the workplace and collective action unions going on strike, working together even 20,000 went on strike to protest the company mishandling sweating they see that there are benefits to working together to improve their lives and trying to create a fear society and fear america. Host thats great. Steve greenhouse, i feel your book lays out how we could have a more hopeful future if we enact policies that just could unleash all this energy that we see around the country so that workers can come up with their own solutions to organize and have a voice that works again. Thank you so much for your book, for your work and thank you for the conversation. Guest this is great. Thank you for doing this with me. Great talking with you. It is great to be here with you all to celebrate and discuss an excellent new book by one of the country countries most orid insightful economicou thinkers, amity shlaes. Over the course of her career, shes got herid