Transcripts For CSPAN3 Jamie 20240704

Middlebury college and has work has been featured in the new york times, new yorker, washington post, jacobin, dissent and, numerous scholarly journals. Jamie is also an elected School Board Representative in vermont and a volunteer. He is joined in conversation tonight by Daniel Schneider the Malcolm Weiner professor of social policy at the Harvard Kennedy and professor of sociology at harvard university. His focuses on precarious work, demography and inequality air tonight. Jamie presenting his new book, a central how the pandemic transformed the long fight for worker justice through firsthand Research Conducted as the pandemic unfolded. Jamie traces the evolution of militancy, showing how their struggles for safer workplaces, pay and health care and the right to unionize benefited all americans and spurred a radical new phase of the Labor Movement. Throughout the coronavirus pandemic essential workers lashed out against low, 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 American Workers had simmered discontent long before their anger boiled over. Chris smalls, president and founder of the Amazon Labor Union called essential a call to action, adding that we need increased workplace militancy to challenge capitalism as workers our labor and our ability withhold. It is our power. And according to nancy mclain, the author of democracy in chains, Jamie Mccallum explains how we reached this moment. Union popularity and new organizing and what the future could hold. An invigorating, urgent book that is, to borrow its title essential. We are so pleased host this event here at Harvard Bookstore tonight. Please join me in welcoming Jamie Mccallum and Daniel Schneider Daniel Schneider. Thank you. All right, grandpa. All right. Thanks so much. Will you give me a little hand signal when we should Start Talking to everyone else can talk. Great. Okay, great. Well, thanks so much, everyone for being here. Jamie, great to see you. Its fun to be in conversation. You know, its been, what, almost three years of the pandemic now, a wild time in American Labor history. We saw some of the sharpest downturns in, employment in modern American History in the early months of the pandemic. Back in 2020, we saw a historic social safety net response cash payments, almost all american families, a child tax that cut poverty by half. When we saw a surprisingly tight labor market with rising labor market power, apparently wages increasing and then a sort of effort to fight inflation by cutting back on this labor market. When you started book, you didnt know what was coming. Why did you decide to write it . How did you keep a pace of these events which the so nicely captures that you really this thing on . Hold on a second. Got it. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Hi, everyone. Thank so much for coming. And thanks to the Harvard Bookstore hosting. Im so excited to be able present this work in person. I wrote another book two years ago that came out the middle of the pandemic and it was nothing. There was no way to share that work with people. So its really a to be able to do that tonight and to be able to talk with danny as always. So i started writing this book as soon as the pandemic left china. Essentially. And i love interviewing workers. Its what its a its fun it sort of helps deal with my curiosity about whats going on. And so i just began talking to people and i wasnt even writing a book, but id written another one, as i said. And that book sort of seemed to go like when the pandemic hit, it sort of seemed like ask more questions than it answered in a way. And i was curious and unsatisfied with what had happened with that. So i started interviewing people and talking to people. And before before long it became clear that whatever there was of a social safety net, whatever there was of. However much, our economy had already been dominated by bad jobs that had been exacerbated ten times over. And it seemed to me like it was that accounts are way i labor organizing was was going to happen to the to respond to some sort of the sort of the covid that was really early in the pandemic and so finding people became really important. The book starts new york city. Ill just a little bit about this at the beginning. Is that okay . Yeah. So the book starts in new york city. One of the first people i interviewed is one of the first people in the book. And you know, i not live in new york or a big city at. All so theres nothing like this happening where i live. You know, she was walking work when people it was the time sort of the pots and pans when people were banging on things and shouting cheers out the windows, out of cabs and on sidewalks to Health Care Workers and delivery drivers and grocery clerks and and janitors and these kinds of folks who were going to work. And she, you know, reminded me of what this felt like a certain sense of pride and a sense of resentment, a sense of frustration and a sense of helplessness, a sense of sort of hopefully ness and defeatism. And so that kind of contradiction is interesting when an interviewer and so from then on, i just began talking to whomever i could and eventually, you know, i interviewed about 100 folks from a lot of essential industries, mostly health care, Food Processing delivery, logistics, education, some of those places retail and talked to them sometimes their friends and family and began crafting began crafting a book. Yeah. While were out there actually talking to people i was trying to survey them through the chef project we were running of workers at some of the same big that you were, you know, interviewing people at and at a high level. We were finding that workers were, you know, kind of, you know, still these precarious jobs, jobs with wages, unstable schedules, not enough paid sick time, not ppe. In the early days of the pandemic. And in increasing like disrespect and bullying and harassment from on the job, what were you hearing in a more nuanced way from workers have long been precarious jobs. These are jobs where weve seen the risky side of the risk shift, where workers have been left holding bag. And in shareholder capitalism. What was it different during the pandemic, these folks . Yeah. Right. So danny and his colleagues at the shift project did a lot of Early Research that people like me ended up using, like some of the first surveys that showed who had ppe, who didnt, who had, you know, workable, healthy schedules, who did those kinds of things. And it was really important to people very early on. So when i theres different ways to do those of research and you get certain data from that kind of research and certain data from this and so, you know, one thing that became interesting is that everyone i talked to or, most people i talked to, we would talk for a while and then they would say, oh, and, you know, there was a walkout a couple of days ago or there was a protest or there was a sit in or people stopped coming to work the other day without without calling in sick or everyone called sick. And there was always weird things were, these small little incidences of like workplace resistance, organizing or protest or whatever, began percolating up from the bottom. And by the time year was over when you could read through the official statistics statistics, they didnt show almost any unrest at all, like the number of large strikes in 2020. There eight, i think, and four of them were led by nurses. Two were in boston and so but when you talk to people, you hear about all this other stuff that sort of gets lost that goes under the radar or gets lost in the official stats. And some of those stories are. Very equal parts, you know, heartbreaking, inspiring. I talked a lot of oakland who i just met tonight, who i to her you probably what, two and a half years ago. What is mom was greeter at walmart in, the boston area. Who who of covid and early on the massachusetts jobs with justice chapter where i first heard your moms story you talked about the sort of the insanity suppose of keeping greeters at walmart all of them not having, you know, adequate protections, basic like paid sick leave. I think was she used up her Vacation Time to take take time off yet had to go back. Right. And so there were these stories and i heard, you know, not to say they werent special in their own way, but i heard a lot of them. And and then you also heard ones were more, um, um, you know, people saw the pandemic as an opportunity. There was a crisis, the state a crisis for capital, a crisis in and there was a window of opportunity by which some people workers, labor organizers, unions, activists sought to try to take advantage of it and to step into the breach, make change that could that could change some of the things as we look back was remarkable in some ways is how little actually changed. Given that given the depth, the crisis and how little weve learned overall. Um, nonetheless, no one likes that story. Its not its not good story to end with. So i think in the beginning but and there is certainly things that came out of it, but nonetheless, i think know early on, especially in 2020, some of those those were some of the stories. Do you mean like you know, you talk about the sort of how acute the precarious conditions became during the pandemic life. Death matter is on the line for jobs that were long, precarious and that you know. So that changed. You also talked about this rhetorical where, you know, people are banging pots and pans thats both affirming, but also its like a profound cognitive dissonance for workers. Are these the things that give rise to this class consciousness that you describe . Whats the whats the secret that gives workers who long alienated this cohesion . Yeah. Yeah. So so during so in the book, i describe sort of a process by which essential worker, essential workers become the essential working class like at one point we look out and we see, um, we see o some Health Care Workers and teachers, drivers and logistics people and whatever and theyre, theyre numbers on a spreadsheet or whatever. And fairly quickly, uh from interviews and talking to people, it became clear that people would get gamed, became to understand themselves as being part of an essential working class or a frontline working class whatever you want to call it. And that was largely defined by their proximity to risk. So we typically think of class American Society either as a just economic divide. The divide, the economy of the quintiles, and some are rich and some are poor or whatever. Or we think of it as people coming to understanding their their, you know, their understanding of themselves in relation to an employer. And this was there was part of that. But i think what really drove it was the understanding that some people risk their lives and other people did not and made the difference. So you get sense of which which almost never happens. Janitors, nurses, lpm and doctors at a similar hospital all of a sudden have all the things in common. They also have in common with the who drive supplies to the hospital, or sometimes the drivers who drive them home or. You know, you name it. There is a way in which these people began to understand as as connected. So when were protests . Um early on in april or march, april, may. There was a lot sporadic protests, especially in the bigger cities. And always said, look, you know, were nurses standing for teachers or were drivers standing up for Food Processors or retail clerks in solidarity with daycare providers or whatever it was. And so that kind of mix began to kind of bubble up. It was a pretty amazing, you know, a pretty interesting phenomena, i guess. You know, ive heard you talk about how that set of labor were all sort of like originals or, de novo against, you know. What we more often see to the extent we see any labor action which is, you know, you know teacher strike in the city. Until then, teacher strike in a similar way in this next city. Right, right. Was an unusual thing to see this sort of innovation. In a sense, yeah. So i think so. You know, you can imagine a couple of years ago there was a major strike way of 2018, 2019 of teachers. There basically copycat strikes. They rocked the nation. It was amazing. Pretty powerful, you know, really important. But it was one industry. And what i think was important about this pandemic of working class is they drew from all these different essential industries and therefore movements that came out of them sort of crosspollinate each other inside the workplace, outside the workplace. So you had black matter talking about, you know, the strike for black lives, like using the language of labor and the pandemic working class itself was so black and brown and female that those sort of concerns about Racial Justice and gender justice began in the within unions in ways doesnt always happen. And so there, uh, you know, worker unrest, um, sort of in a wave but not siloed in industry. So at least in that first year, first 18 months. And i think that was like the strike tober thing, thats what happened to the fall of 2021 because it was you had john deere people out you had symphony musicians our whiskey makers, our adjunct professors. Health care workers. Teachers threatening to strike all Different Things happening in different parts. And i think that sort of that you know diversity of activism was a pretty interesting development. I came out of it. And to extent, you know, we see of that stuff. How would you say it sort of animating whats happening today . Know you know, we think about you in the classic words of one of our colleagues, what unions do we often think about them as providing higher pay or Better Benefits or maybe a lofty sense of voice what will workers after in this . Is that what these essential this, you know, class in the making in these in these actions . Or was it something more fundamental of like safety or even the rights of others . Mm hmm. Mm hmm. So, yeah this is a great question. So you you know, we typically of unions as providing benefits their members and they do union people make more money they have better care, better jobs, better stability. Its all to figure out. However, during the pandemic, there was other stuff going and there were other sort of like union premiums that accrued not just to Union Members, not just their immediate people. But i think the society at large. So ill talk a little bit about that, um, the epicenter of the pandemic was in Nursing Homes um for for weird reasons ive been obsessed with unionized Nursing Homes for like 25 years. I used to be a Union Nursing Home organizer briefly. I was a home care worker before that and uh, so i started, i joined with a group of people who were studying unionized homes. The or in Nursing Homes in general here in the pandemic. So the, the take away or the quick shot from that is that if you were a if you or your Family Member or a loved one were in a nursing home that had a union, they were about 11 less likely to die of in 2020 and 2021 than if there wasnt a union. If you were a worker in a nursing, you were far less likely get covid unionize as worker. Workers in Nursing Homes routinely spread virus from home to home. They spread their own Family Members. They spread it to people they worked for. Like every nursing home worker i talked to and there was a lot like routinely lamented the fact that they knew they were bringing covid to their patients who died it because their jobs were so bad that they had to work in two homes or they had to work in three homes or a multiple jobs. A union limits that possibility a little bit. It also gives you a voice on the job to be able to say just to speak up to say like hey we need x more ppe more protections. Unionized workers get paid time to get vaccinated. They have greater paid sick leave. All these kinds things that just kept people alive. Um, so theres that in health care and education it was similar. Um, uh, teachers unions are some them or teachers or some of the probably the most organized unionized labor force in the country. Um, some place the unions are very strong. So i talked to folks in chicago, l. A. Philly, atlanta, and what they all said was like, look, if, you know, if the school or whoever wanted us to go back early, we pushed for a later start date. If denied as the mask mandate. We pushed a mask mandate and we won. They pushed for their students, their families to get priority unvaccinated and less. Um, in other all these sort of things that not just to Union Workers but to the rest of us. So to speak, what people call bargaining for the common good, like a way to use your leverage as a union, as someone with a labor contract to sort of negotiate goods or services for others. It doesnt always work. Its really hard. But there was a time during the pandemic when seemed obvious to a lot of people and when in some ways worked a little bit better than it otherwise did. The the cautionary tale to this stories is like meatpacking, where i talked workers, everyone who knew three workers who died. I to Family Members who who had lost multiple Family Members in the same in the same family. Um. And their unions are weak and theyre ineffectual and theyre disorganized and theyd been busted for 34, 35 years and you dont have the same power. You dont have the same strength. And i think difference was very clear. And so you have you know, people are talking about the Union Difference like a wage premium. There was sort of a Health Premium that accrued to all of us through the pandemic. We have those folks to thank for it. Yeah, its a pretty powerful idea. There is this bargaining in the public interest. Its some of the same rhetoric, the some folks use around federal policy that workers paid sick leave, not just because they should stay home when theyre sick to recover or to take care of their Family Members. But because when sick workers of the capacity to stay home because still paid, thats going to reduce the spread covid and other illnesses. But that language doesnt seem to have done the job. Weve seen very little federal durable federal action coming of this pandemic. Weve seen very little voluntary employer action coming out of this pandemic. You alluded to this a little while ago, but yeah, it surprised saying is it not or maybe it shouldnt be. Yeah, i think it is surprising. I think it was the you know, in some ways, if you can imagine it was in 2019 saying what we need to win certain reforms is a real crisis to drive home the severity and the importance of just like paid sick leave we had it and it didnt. It wasnt enough, right . Like and what that shows us, i think, is that the abject the sort of classical objective conditions, um, arent, arent enough. Like we need like organizational power and strength and, uh, strategy to take advantage a crisis and labors weakness did forestall a lot of lasting change. I mean. Right, even today we found out that biden, who declared himself the most prounion president since lincoln on the day he got into office, is snowballing. The railroad for a paid sick day. Its like its like the pandemic never happened. You know, it really is. I mean, biden spent his entire career not being bernie sanders. And then he gets into office. He tries to be the next and he comes back to it. So like in the last few days and really abandoning that whole mission and, you know, its a very dangerous proposal to do that because what happens is you get conservatives who step into the breach and say, actually, those workers deserve a good a raise. Those workers deserve a good deal. And driving and driving the workers away from the Democratic Party as, theyve been driving them for five decades. And i mean, theyre not theyre being cynical, those folks on the right. But, you know, its a message and sometimes it works and so i think, you know, at a point right now where we often think of as well lets get policy that can help workers organize. Lets lets get the pro act that will radically transform labor law and we can organize and well see, you know, but history shows this is more far more likely is that we will have to do something to get the pro act like there will have to be a crisis, a series of rolling strikes, what you name it that we can take it take advantage of to create a crisis big enough to get legislation that we need not the other way around. And a lot of people i think there is now in the Labor Movement especially the kind of newish uh, i know there is a youngish brand of it are realizing that i dont talking like that and labor that before werent are as well and i think theres some encouraging whatever im an optimist i think theres some encouraging signs there even all the some of the things i just said. Yeah. So pick on that in the last couple of minutes before, we open it up for q a. You know, we have seen how an amazing degree of coverage of the of the of Union Organizing at amazon and then at starbucks we now see the railroads we see the pilots to some extent. But you see do school, you know, theres really a lot going on. But on the other hand, were talking 300 starbucks at a 15,000 establishments in the united states, talking about one amazon warehouse. Is this the sort of flash in the pan or these the sparks that are really going to ignite this increased labor power that win us not just representation for those workers, but maybe. Yeah. The political might to get paid sick leave to get paid family leave to get the pro act to spark this virtuous cycle. The only, um, that is the question that of course we can only really answer like five years from now, but uh, and thats joined us in 2027. Yes. For, for volume two of this book. Um, but i guess it depends like where you look, and to some extent the kinds of people that you talk to that know theyre talking about. Like if you compare it to previous, you know, if you think about the thirties when there was a resurgent right when workers had very little rights at all. When White Supremacy was, um, when the left to some extent was also ascendant. Um, then, you know, and you the out of that you get some of the conflagrations that gave us the new that gave us some things like pretty reforms like what that took was um, a like 25 times the kind of labor struggles that we see today and you know whatever if past is then thats what would have to happen. And thats not happening. So theres the answer. However, what i think is interesting is not just the the extent, i guess the sort of surge were experiencing in union worker activity, but the the diversity like in the 1930 is also like there was actually surprisingly low level of support for workers like america and largely favor turning the tanks on the sit in strikers in the midwest today not the case. About 65 of americans support labor unions. Thats higher than its been since the sixties, um. You know. Young people support labor unions the way they havent in decades. Somehow unions got cool. Again, i dont dont really know how it happened. Actually. But but it did. Thats carried and also the the working today is far more um black and brown more female than it was in previous decades. That creates a different of working Class Movement and the folks that are you mentioned now abuse of the system was that the largest strike in california. I mean, education industry, um amazon theres almost always to our president historians kept arguing like, whats amazon like . And its like nothing. Its not like anything else. The starbucks campaigns are really interesting. Um, and think right now were at a point where those campaigns have to prove that they can change peoples lives like thats what unions do. In the best case, they bring people through a struggle they change their life. Others see happen. They join and so far to some extent that last of like getting a contract really transforming your letting other people see how that happens like it hasnt happened to the extent that we wished it would um so is that like a, you know, a bad sign or what. I think theres a way which this momentum is, is, is building like we do not see i dont know but people in the audience like are you i do not see the you you see thing coming i interviewed chris smalls two years ago and i remember him talking he was outside jeff bezos his with a guillotine in dc and hes like, were not going to stop till we get unions at amazon. And i was like, you think that that will ever happen . Hes like, of course it will happen. And i hung up the phone. That will never happen. Never in his life. Is this guy going to get unions . Amazon. And then he did. He did. And you know the Amazon Labor Union gets six or 700 emails a month from amazon workers being like, i want to like way more than they can possibly respond to. Like the demand is there and to some extent our you know, im not sure if were at a place where we have the capacity to even to even deal with some of this momentum. So, you know, how do we funnel that momentum into a movement that can last and be durable . Thats, you know, thats sort the the question that i theres a few organizers in the audience tonight and they might have some interesting perspectives on that. All right, thanks, jimi, with that great transition, lets open it up. You can call your questions or ill do it if you prefer. Okay. Hi my names paul. I have two questions, but my save this second one for after the the the group. But guess the first question that really popped into my mind as i was listening to you talk was about optimism you said youre an optimist. I mean im a pessimist or im you know, im like very i think very negative. But have been a labor activist my whole life. And im looking at the Railway Situation and i spoke to one of the Railway Workers today and basically. The leadership of those unions are sucking up to the Democratic Party, because thats what theyve always done. The membership voted down, strike the contract. Yeah, but theyre scared, you know, theyre facing the of the united states. But you know, theyre pretty sophisticated it workers. I mean theyve been in the union for ever. Yeah they know what the unions about Railway Workers are like the first workers to organize. If they dont strike like yeah were how can you be optimistic . You know, i mean. Its. Its i mean, people people i mean, the railway these people are. Are just beaten down. Yeah. Yeah. Jimi, pick it up. Yeah. Uh, so on the thing, first of all, ill just say that theres a, you know, i have always appreciated sort of truism. True is truism. Uh from antonio gramsci, the famous writer who said, you know, have the pessimism of the intellect and, the optimism of the will and, certainly like as someone who has been doing organizing or in the labor organizing sphere for a while, like its you learn pretty quickly that like hope or whatever is sometimes in small supply and even workers with a union are screwed very often and sometimes those unions even, you know arent arent as effective as want them to be. Um, i guess what said i was optimistic. I, you know, i, i looked at the, i guess, i looked at that chart in 2020 and saw that basically there were no one, there was no one on strike. And i was like, well, a strike is a decent measure of not people being upset, but people having hope, like you dont go on strike if youre. I mean, youre going to strike because have the aspiration that your job will be better. And the fact that there was none was was kind of a bummer to me. And then i started, you know as i started realizing that actually there was all this other stuff happening. And so the worst time of history of, my lifetime, there was a a kind of explosion of, people doing different kinds of organizing work. Some of it was nontraditional, some of it was very small. Some of the spontaneous. A third of the workers who walked off the job, 2020 had no union at all, which almost never happens in good times. And so i guess it from that that i was trying the optimism the railroad situation is indeed bleak. I dont know you know, its its its bleak and you know, i dont know. I talked to a few people actually last week in the the rebel Workers Union and some said well you said some had a little bit more of a hopeful outlook that they could pressure biden to change at the last hour or whatever. I dont know. But i dont know. I think its like the thing that will probably have to, you know, only with hindsight, what we really probably know, i guess thank you. Yeah, thanks thanks. What else . Yeah, go for it. So im just curious how important the Regulatory Environment, you know, for labor and and whats it like now is it good, bad, indifferent, you know i think. Yeah. Oh yeah. The nlrb stuff. Yeah. So for everyone, the nlrb, National Labor Relations Board is the board that like governs Union Elections and is sort administers some labor to do these kinds of things. Um, my understanding is thats basically good because better than its been in a long time anyways, put it that way, i mean, biden fired peter robb, the conservative head of the board, the first day, which was a good first day thing to do. Um, the nlrb, uh, theyve gotten, i think 66 more Union Election last year than theyve gotten then got the year before, for example. In other words, surge. They. As far as i understand it. Like cant keep up. Like they cant literally process and hold the number of elections the people who are filing for them, which is an incredible problem. But if follow nlrb on twitter, which i do theyre insane. Like every day just like like give us more money, give us more staff. Give us more resources because were not being able to do our jobs. And so thats a bad obviously. But in some ways theyre overwhelmed by the good side of it. I think that is good. I do think, i guess the other side of the regulatory is that i do think employers have been emboldened to go on the counter offensive like there does seem to be like a real um people being like, look, the pandemic is over. Were not these pandemic things anymore. Were not doing extended anything. Are unemployment system is still a complete broken, dilapidated show. I mean disaster or whatever and and so those kinds of things still uh are still in the air and they, they do create a Regulatory Environment sort de facto. Um, so i guess thats what i would say. Yeah, its a good question. Yeah. What i hear in the, um. I wanted to ask you, i actually wrote it down if have, have other countries, have they treated the essential workers better during the pandemic and so why. That . Thats a great question. Um, so yeah, so um, let me so theres some like in, so in general, uh yes, i so i think in general theres a way in which like the social democratic atmosphere in europe, like creates better conditions for workers like workers of better jobs, like jobs here are better jobs there and in other words, uh, unions in a different way in which, in which workers going to fight is hard to win them whatever won in march when the economy crashed in, in plenty of plenty of those workers did not lose their jobs like they were furloughed not laid off which means the hiring practices the the rehiring a year later does not involve sort of the disastrous problem we had so they were to hire people back faster, much easier. So those conditions were better in meatpacking plants example like meatpacking plants operate much slower in europe and theyre much smaller. So if it ravages of meat plant, you can shut down one and run the others without having the disastrous effects we had. Um, they operate little slower, a little safer. And as far as i know, like no meat shortage in europe. Like people, their fair share, whatever whenever they want. Fine. Um, so thats a better example in other places where, you know, before covid working conditions worse in some parts, the global south, they were also, um, hit harder. I did not do really any sort of system work at the global stuff. Um, there were, um, there was a lot of sort of under, very, under the radar underground organizing china that happened where right after it started especially among delivery drivers and workers, they are treated like i mean its illegal to have a union in china. Um, so overall what is interesting about our situation here i think is overall is that we have a bizarre where we have a comparable rich country and comparably, uh, you know, pathetic environment to work in and, and that was that fact was sort of exacerbated, i guess during the pandemic. Yeah well go here. Yeah. And then to their. Go ahead sir. Just picking up on what you said about the employer your pushback, it just seems bizarre that the Business Community is screaming the socalled labor shortage and yet workers are leaving because of working conditions and just wanting do for example, working home when it has proven successful during the pandemic so why is that . Why has the pandemic not softened the attitudes of business . Yeah, yeah okay, thats a good question. So first of all, the labor shortage, which you have directly there is all there is interesting confusion. I think, you know, when it first started, whenever that was technically or whatever, you know, why is there a labor shortage and everyone there was a lot of confusion and what what occurred at some point you know i realized the census just asked people why they not work last week and you could just it up what their answer is and what they say is that for about months from late 2022, whenever that after that is they were caring for people like they were caring for kids or Family Members or had covid recovered sick people or whatever, like the crisis of the labor shortage was a it was a crisis of care for that for that period. Um, the weird extension of it i think is a more bizarre question, far more confusing and one that i think a lot of people are arguing about. But your question about the like why hasnt it softened or whatever . Um, i mean, obviously i guess youre implying that you think it should as do i, as do you know, probably a lot of people, um, but i dont know. I think, um, we dont have you have some say youve got this great line in the book where you say theres not a yacht shortage if you only want to, pay 500 for a yacht. Oh, theres not a house shortage. If youre only willing to pay 10 a month for rent. Why . Why . We say theres a labor shortage when youre only willing to pay 10 an hour and give anyone any flexibility in the schedules. Um, so to what extent . Right. I mean, right. So, so theres a shortage of or a surplus jobs rather than a labor shortage, i guess. Yeah, its one way. Thats one way to put it. Um, and, you know, i dont, i cant think of anything that is softened employers resolve. Like, you know, have gotten if there is a graph called employers resolve, you could draw a Straight Line from 1930 to now and it would go one direction. And that means like offloading employment, health care, offloading unemployment risks like in other words, like spreading risk from theyre responsible. 32 hours is what that is like. The business thats thats the business. Um, you know, employers began hiring children during the pandemic like wisconsin their law to allow them hire children and then they changed the phrase child labor to be called it employment of minor minors like they hired during the pandemic. And i think right now as the pandemic is like getting over whatever we are, we are seeing that hardening. Like even i mean, workers, the only said at the beginning, like child poverty. Poverty drastically reduced from the cares to the American Rescue plan. Tax credit like those things actually some pretty good things. And like workers still had pandemic Unemployment Benefits sloshing around their bank accounts. Two years later, some of that is drying up now. But there was a way which some of that pandemic welfare state, i think, really infuriated the employment class. And they are pushing back. And i think to some extent thats what were seeing now. Yeah, go ahead. Thats great. Thank you. When you started by talking about your interviews, it struck me that were just about a half century since studs terkel was doing his interviews for working and of course, a lot has changed in these 50 years, massively increased. And you know, welldocumented decline in the power organized labor. And as you said tonight, the crisis wasnt enough. Is lack of organizational power. And i wonder if you could speculate if this pandemic had hit when terkel was doing these interviews, would the sentiments that you received in your interviews, how would they have been different different right. You had said circle did that. Where did working when it was working published or when was working published . 1974 that way. Okay. Um, so studs terkel is the, i mean, the sort ultimate, you know, example of a, a guy who just woke up one day and began talking to everyone and he wrote book and book after booktv dot org to people. And you know, the most famous being being working would have been the same like the interviews i said the same to me. They said to him or vice versa. You mean at a time when the power of organized labor is supposed to have been much greater . Yeah i mean, it was greater. Um, but 74 it was like not a great time either. So dont, i dont know. I think the one thing that i guess would have different was you had, you had a much less multiracial, multi gendered working class, um, which probably like the people, the workers, the, the book is mostly, most people i interviewed are women of color for the most part when you think of, you know, we often of like the future of work and we think of like gleaming workplaces with like in factories stuff. And the future of work is like a of color in scrubs and 11 an hour caring people. Thats like what the jobs are and those jobs there was a different like employment landscape than i suppose like a more a more industrial one, a less service, the one that might have that might have made things different. There was at that time like a farm, greater relevance of labor unrest. And that might have made perhaps might have been people optimistic about some of that taking, uh, um, effect but i also think that of the things i heard were very visceral and very personal and to some extent, uh, i dont know, like timely or something. And people were scared to death basically. I think they would have been scared death then. Um, 74 that was like the year after osha was passed. Um, i think osha formed like there was almost no body regulatory body, a government of workplace during the pandemic. Osha didnt really do anything either, but at least there was one, you know. And, uh so maybe that some of those things i guess would have been factors. What people said. But its its tough to know know go ahead. I was hi jamie. I was just wondering what you thought of this part of labor organizing thats happening now thats so obviously connected to how many people have been urged to go to college age and then end up in essentially low wage jobs with bit trillion dollars in Student Loans . I think thats obviously extremely to some of the organizing thats going on like at starbucks. I mean, some of the people organizing at starbucks are lawyers and baristas. Right. Right right. So im just curious about about that. Well, i mean i mean, this is the classic example. Ask you a question which you probably have a better student. I do. So that my friend. Yeah. Yeah. But so ill say a few things i do think that is one of the main reasons why like, um, if you can think of like bernie dsa and some of the things that make young people in unions, again, one thing is necessity because as said, there is like an increasing class of people who probably started with like sort of my generation of College Graduates who are graduating now with debt and in an employment landscape where a College Degree doesnt mean nearly what what it used to be. And so standing up for yourself on, the job is like a form of selfdefense a form of selfrespect. And i think that totally, um, is, um, you know, it is a factor. Its tough to know i mean that thats also helps explain we saw even prepandemic we saw a wave of organizing in like Tech Startups and online and like what was the gothamist remember they organize all of a sudden it was like all these like sort of like people with masters degrees were all of a sudden being like, you know, we really need this, too. And i think that, you know, is an Important Development like we the classic man argument about unions is that theyre for old white guys and, shiny jackets who work in factories and a like, you know, statistic really that just doesnt even begin to who are Union Members today and you know we its easy to sort of i think denigrate unions as that. But it really hold true anymore. And i think slowly people are beginning to realize that theres a new theres like a new kind working class. And theyre not just people from working class families, not people from whose parents whose dads worked in whatever like they have College Degrees, some of them have masters advanced degrees and theyre working class people. And they have a they should have a home movement. And so that i think tendency is becoming more more common. Yeah yeah. All hi, jeff nelson. Nice to meet you. Jane oh, hi. Hey. So um, the kind of optimism. Pessimism spectrum. Im curious what you think about the impact of. Greater wealth and higher wages that some people have have gained through the period of, of the pandemic. So im thinking you know, im in the retail and hospital, the hospitality space and food service and a lot of workers there are, you know, not that jobs are great, but theyre making a lot than they were three years ago. Yeah. And does the fact that theyre bringing home a little bit more money give optimism in their ability to fight for something than that . Yeah, thats interesting i thought youre going to say the opposite. I thought youre going to that maybe if you can see people more money or more things or whatever by organizing that, that would dissuade you. But i was i dont think, um, i dont know, i, its like maybe, you know, with the current figures are on that, like its tough to do, you know, i mean, i think its, i know a little mean so wages are absolute we up in nominal terms over the last few years especially at the bottom. Um and and its a pretty dramatic increase we have seen for the first time in 50 years and narrowing of of income inequality in america driven by the bottom decile worker. I mean thats a its a big deal our colleague at mit, nate, has just shown this using, you know, really excellent data. Its a big deal. Now, inflation is cut that more for workers bottom. We got to spend every cent than those at the top but i its right all right thats thats my data interlude. Yeah yeah. So thats good. So i so i dont know, i dont think getting a little or a little bit or more than a little bit more is what this way its people from working. I again you probably see this in your sector but um my guess is that like if employers havent softened and if Workplace Safety regulations havent dramatically improved, if blah blah blah, if our prounion president is no longer, if theres always other things that that are on the table are still on the table like the reasons that organize are even better. Also, those wages, as organizers always say, like can disappear like those they can go back down, right . Like you can lose, your wages can decline, you can lose your care benefits. You lose these things unless you have a, uh, a union. And i think people understand that. And i think theyre, you know, people are taking you know to some extent in certain essential understanding that the necessity of of dealing with that problem, hopefully great. Were almost out of time here. But i think if we had any more questions, we could take one more. If not, jimmy generously agreed to stick around for as long as people like and having a chat and signs and books. Um, so maybe well wrap it up right there. Thank you. Thank you all so much. You can buy a copy of the book right over there and you dont mind doing a signing up this table. Okay, ill, ill, ill also ill hang out. Okay. Yeah, im great. Thank you yeah. Thanks so much for doing well. Thank you,ce to defeat