Government Work

Best known as a monumental achievement of the civil rights movement, the 1964 Civil Rights Act also revolutionized the lives of America's working women. Title VII of the law made it illegal to discriminate "because of sex". But that simple phrase didn't mean much until ordinary women began using the law to get justice on the job - and some took their fights all the way to the Supreme Court.

Growing numbers of Americans are doing work that they care about and enjoy. But they're frustrated by stagnant wages, shrinking health coverage, shaky pension plans, and company polices that make it more difficult for them to do their jobs well. Corporate executives may be becoming less loyal to their employees, but those same employees still want to be loyal to their company.

Apple orchards in bucolic Washington state. Office parks in Southern California under cover of night. The home of an elderly man in Miami. These are some of the workplaces where female workers have suffered brutal sexual assault and shocking harassment at the hands of their employers, often with little or no official recourse. In this harrowing yet often inspiring tale, investigative journalist Bernice Yeung exposes the epidemic of sexual violence levied against women farmworkers, domestic workers, and janitorial workers and charts their quest for justice in the workplace.

Drawing on nearly three decades in education - from his mother’s after-school program on Chicago’s South Side to his tenure as Secretary of Education in DC - How Schools Work follows Arne as he takes on challenges at every turn: gangbangers in Chicago housing projects, parents who call him racist, teachers who insist they can’t help poor kids, unions that refuse to modernize, Tea Partiers who call him an autocrat, affluent white progressive moms who hate yearly tests, and even the NRA, which once labeled Arne the “most extreme anti-gun member of President Obama's Cabinet.”

The current conventional-wisdom view of our soon-to-be future is rose-tinted: Automation will free millions of people from the drudgery of work, then by taxing the robots doing all the work, we can pay everyone universal basic income (UBI), enabling a life of leisure and artistic pursuit for all. The result: a future of universal happiness. But is this accurate? Is this what UBI is actually capable of doing? More importantly, is this what we want? And even more importantly: Will this “future” be our best future? Listen to find out more.

Solutions...not theories. Political progress...not political posturing. Instead of the constant jockeying for political advantage, in What Works, author and columnist Cal Thomas focuses on what promotes the general welfare, regardless of which party or ideology gets the credit. Thomas probes and provides answers to questions like: Why must we constantly fight the same battles over and over? Why don't we consult the past and use common sense in order to see that what others discovered long ago still works today?

Antivaxxers are crazy. That is the perception we all gain from the media, the internet, celebrities, and beyond, writes Bernice Hausman in Anti/Vax, but we need to open our eyes and ears so that we can all have a better conversation about vaccine skepticism and its implications. Hausman argues that the heated debate about vaccinations and whether to get them or not is most often fueled by accusations and vilifications rather than careful attention to the real concerns of many Americans.

To ArcelorMittal Steel, Eliese is known as #6691: Utility Worker, but this was never her dream. Fresh out of college, eager to leave behind her conservative hometown and come to terms with her Christian roots, Eliese found herself applying for a job at the local steel mill. The mill is everything she was trying to escape, but it's also her only shot at financial security in an economically devastated and forgotten part of America. In Rust, Eliese brings the listener inside the belly of the mill and the middle American upbringing that brought her there in the first place.

In a wide-ranging narrative that takes us from a downsized marketing executive in Massachusetts, to a father of three in Appalachia finding purpose and meaning working in a convenience-store chain, to an unemployed autoworker retraining in "advanced manufacturing", Shell reveals how work is essential to our flourishing and pyschological well-being - and how so many of the avenues to well-paid and meaningful work will be challenged in the years ahead.

In recent years, dreams about our technological future have soured as digital platforms have undermined privacy, eroded labor rights, and weakened democratic discourse. In light of the negative consequences of innovation, some blame harmful algorithms or greedy CEOs. Behind the Startup focuses instead on the role of capital and the influence of financiers. Drawing on nineteen months of participant-observation research inside a successful Silicon Valley startup, this book examines how the company was organized to meet the needs of the venture capital investors who funded it.

Immer mehr junge Menschen wollen sich für politische, soziale und ökologische Ziele einsetzen. Raul Krauthausen und Benjamin Schwarz ermutigen durch Gespräche mit erfolgreichen Aktivist*innen und inspirieren zu eigenem Engagement. Lange galt Aktivismus eher als Synonym für krawalligen Protest denn als ernsthafte politische Arbeit. Indem Krauthausen und Schwarz den Begriff des konstruktiven Aktivismus in die Debatte einführen, schaffen sie ein neues Verständnis.

In a climate of culture wars and tremendous economic uncertainty, America is often reduced to a simplistic schism between red states and blue states. In response to that oversimplification, journalist Dante Chinni teamed up with political geographer James Gimpel to launch the Patchwork Nation project, using on-the-ground reporting and statistical analysis to get past generalizations and probe American communities in depth.

Our world is about to change. In Digital Destiny: How the New Age of Data Will Change the Way We Live, Work, and Communicate, Shawn DuBravac, chief economist and senior director of research at the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), argues that the groundswell of digital ownership unfolding in our lives signals the beginning of a new era for humanity.

With falling wages and rising inequality, persistent unemployment, failing schools, and broken cities, have America's best days come and gone? In America Needs Talent, Jamie Merisotis, a globally recognized leader in philanthropy, higher education, and public policy, explains why talent is needed to usher in a new era of innovation and success and why deliberate choices must be made by government, the private sector, education, and individuals to grow talent in America.

Bigger has turned out not to be better. Servicing the global economy has exacted a heavy toll in the erosion of our communities and the destruction of our environment. Increasingly, we are coming to realize that the way forward looks a lot like the way back — back to strong local economies, back to resilient, tight-knit communities, back to the land and work that is real. As we chart our course through these uncertain times, we are hungry for inspiration.

Why are some of the most interesting artists of our time committed to engaging with conflict and exploitation around the world? Beautiful, Gruesome, and True tells the stories of three of them: Amar Kanwar makes riveting films about the destruction of rural India in the drive to extract natural resources. Teresa Margolles creates haunting installations from the traces of crime scenes and drug-related violence in Mexico. The anonymous collective Abounaddara has produced more than four hundred short films chronicling the uprising and civil war in Syria.

Thirty years ago, the best-selling "letter to the government", Work in America, was published to national acclaim, including front-page coverage in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. It sounded an alarm about worker dissatisfaction and the effects on the nation as a whole.

Based on extensive research with organizations and companies that are boldly breaking out of business as usual, Beloved Economies offer listeners an imagination-expanding vision of what work could be. Authors Rimington and Cea explore possibilities for how we work, learning with more than sixty people from a wide array of enterprises. What these groups have in common is that they are generating forms of success that audaciously prioritize well-being, meaning, connection and resilience—alongside conventional metrics like quality and financial success.

The United States has been epitomized as a land of opportunity, where hard work and skill can bring personal success and economic well-being. The American Dream has captured the imagination of people from all walks of life, and to many, it represents the heart and soul of the country. But there is another, darker side to the bargain that America strikes with its people - it is the price we pay for our individual pursuit of the American Dream.

In this audiobook, Melvin Delgado offers a compelling case for the centrality of sanctuary cities' cause to the very mission and professional identity of social workers and others in the human services and mental-health professions. He also presents a historical perspective on the rise of the sanctuary movements of the 1970s and 2000s, giving context for the current environment and immigration debate.