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Subscribe to Working-Class Perspectives - Working-Class Perspectives offers weekly commentaries on current issues related to working-class people and communities. Contributors discuss a variety of issues, from what class means to how it intersects with race and gender to how class is shaping American politics. We welcome relevant comments of 500 words or less.
For questions or comments about this blog, e-mail Sherry Linkon. For assistance with news stories about working-class politics and culture, call or e-mail John Russo, 330-207-8085. Categories
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The State of the Working Class
Listen to Working-Class Perspective editor Sherry Linkon's recent interview about Working-Class Studies on KERA's Think with Krys Boyd.Links
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Category Archives: The Working Class and the Economy
The Pandemic as an Employment Shell Game
I have always been skeptical of the use of labor statistics. In 2009, I began to write in Working-Class Perspectives about the de facto unemployment rate, because official reports on the unemployment rate in Youngstown left out much of the … Continue reading
Building Back Better?
As we await U.S. Senate action on President Biden’s Build Back Better plan, it is worth reflecting on what the past few tumultuous months have meant for U.S. workers. Much has happened in the short time since the summer drew … Continue reading
Dirty Jobs, Essential Workers, and the Infrastructure Bills
Current negotiations over the second infrastructure bill may remind a lot of people of Mike Rowe’s oddly popular series Dirty Jobs. Which makes sense. Watching a man stumble around inside a sewage tank as he gags loudly and directs us … Continue reading
How Government Statistics Define the Stories of the Working Class
One of my favorite media criticism works is British journalist and media professor Brian Winston’s “On Counting the Wrong Things.” He argues that the categories we use to count can themselves lead to misleading conclusions. Deciding to count the number … Continue reading
Blue-Collar Babies: Why America’s Working Class Needs Affordable Child Care
In Netflix’s must-see new series, Maid, Alex (Margaret Qualley) flees a violent boyfriend with her two-year-old in tow, only to discover the gordian knot of being an impoverished, unhoused, single mom. Affordable child care is at the knot’s center. Alex … Continue reading
Posted in Class and the Media, Contributors, Issues, Lane Windham, The Working Class and the Economy, Work
Tagged American Family Plan, child care, Maid
1 Comment
Class and Water: Climate-Charged Displacement
Hurricane Ida in Louisiana in August and the historic wildfires in the West and Midwest are the latest reminders that too much water, or too little, will be in the headlines for the rest of our lives. But to call … Continue reading
Posted in Contributors, Issues, Ken Estey, The Working Class and the Economy
Tagged climate change, infrastructure, Jobs
1 Comment
“Don’t Get Old”: On Ageing and the Working Class
In the US sitcom Superstore (2015-2021), one of the characters, Myrtle, is an elderly store assistant who is often the brunt of jokes due to the slow pace of her work and her overall dottiness. At one point in the … Continue reading
Some Dreamers of the Rusty Dream
In the new Showtime series, American Rust, set and filmed outside of Pittsburgh, PA, and based on the 2009 novel by Philipp Meyer, we see the aftermath of an industrial collapse so devastating that the fictional town of Buell, PA, … Continue reading
Fighting Poverty with Classism
I spent part of last week at the Chautauqua Institution, which a friend described as “summer camp for adults.” Its lovely Victorian summer homes, pricey food options, and demographics – skewing older and extremely white – make it feel like … Continue reading
Biden and Social Wages
If Biden’s American Family Plan becomes law as he proposed it, my grand-niece Harri will finally have a “modest yet adequate” standard of living based on a new commitment from the federal government to provide social wages. Harri is a … Continue reading
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