The Raging 2020s

by Alec Ross

  These programs were so successful: “[Archive] When Islam eradicated Poverty: Umar b. Abdul Aziz & Zakat,” National Zakat Foundation, accessed July 14, 2020, https://nzf.org.uk/news/when-islam-eradicated-poverty-umar-b-abdul-aziz-zakat/.

  Unlike many other developed countries: Ganesh Sitaraman and Anne L. Alstott, The Public Option: How to Expand Freedom, Increase Opportunity, and Promote Equality (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019), 12.

  The private model emerged out of a quirk: Aaron E. Carroll, “The Real Reason the U.S. Has Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance,” New York Times, September 5, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/05/upshot/the-real-reason-the-us-has-employer-sponsored-health-insurance.html.

  Between 2002 and 2018: James Manyika, Anu Madgavkar, Tilman Tacke, Jonathan Woetzel, Sven Smit, and Abdulla Abdulaal, The Social Contract in the 21st Century: Outcomes So Far for Workers, Consumers, and Savers in Advanced Economies, McKinsey Global Institute, February 2020, https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Industries/Social Sector/Our Insights/The social contract in the 21st century/MGI-The-social-contract-in-the-21st-century-Full-report-final.pdf.

  These growing expenses disproportionately: Bourree Lam, “The Surging Cost of Basic Needs,” Atlantic, June 2, 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/06/household-basic-spending/485330/.

  researchers found that 40 percent of American households: Natasha Bach, “Millions of Americans Are One Missed Paycheck away from Poverty, Report Says,” Fortune, January 29, 2019, https://fortune.com/2019/01/29/americans-liquid-asset-poor-propserity-now-report/; “A Profile of the Working Poor, 2017,” US Bureau of Labor Statistics, April 2019, https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/working-poor/2017/home.htm.

  Workers who received welfare payments: Henry Aaron, “The Social Safety Net: The Gaps That COVID-19 Spotlights,” Brookings Institution, June 23, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/06/23/the-social-safety-net-the-gaps-that-covid-19-spotlights/.

  transformed China from an agrarian state: “Poverty Headcount Ratio at $1.90 a Day (2011 PPP) (% of Population)—World, China,” World Bank Group, accessed July 20, 2020, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.DDAY?end=2015&locations=1W-CN&start=1981&view=chart.

  3: THE WORKERS

  On Wednesday, December 30, 1936: Timothy P. Lynch, “How Did Workers Win the Right to Form a Union and Go on Strike?,” History News Network, George Washington University, September 3, 2017, https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/166796; “Sit-Down Strike Begins in Flint,” This Day in History: December 30, 1936, History.com, December 27, 2019, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/sit-down-strike-begins-in-flint; Erik de Gier, “Paradise Lost Revisited: GM and the UAW in Historical Perspective” (working paper, Cornell University, ILR School, 2010), http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/intlvf/30.

  Surrounded by the half-built bodies: Erin Blakemore, “The 1936 Strike That Brought America’s Most Powerful Automaker to Its Knees,” History.com, September 17, 2019, https://www.history.com/news/flint-sit-down-strike-general-motors-uaw; David D. Jackson, “The Fisher Body Flint, MI Plant #1 in World War Two,” The American Automobile History in World War Two, November 7, 2019, http://usautoindustryworldwartwo.com/Fisher%20Body/fisherbodyflintone.htm; “The GM Strike That Changed the U.S. Workplace,” Detroit News, July 14, 2018, https://www.detroitnews.com/picture-gallery/news/local/michigan-history/2018/07/14/the-gm-strike-that-changed-the-us-workplace/36797583/.

  GM got a court order: Blakemore, “The 1936 Strike That Brought America’s Most Powerful Automaker to Its Knees,” https://www.history.com/news/flint-sit-down-strike-general-motors-uaw.

  The heat shuddered off on January 11: Vivian Baulch and Patricia Zacharias, “The Historic 1936–37 Flint Auto Plant Strikes,” Detroit News, June 23, 1997, https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20120726124441/http://apps.detnews.com/apps/history/index.php?id=115.

  After the clash, Michigan’s governor deployed: Blakemore, “The 1936 Strike That Brought America’s Most Powerful Automaker to Its Knees,” https://www.history.com/news/flint-sit-down-strike-general-motors-uaw.

  After some 136,000 GM employees: Blakemore, “The 1936 Strike That Brought America’s Most Powerful Automaker to Its Knees,” https://www.history.com/news/flint-sit-down-strike-general-motors-uaw.

  The GM sit-down strike was called: Sidney Fine, Sit-Down: The General Motors Strike of 1936–1937 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969), 341.

  workers in Detroit launched eighty-seven sit-down strikes: Ertan Tuncer, “The Flint, Michigan, Sit-Down Strike (1936–37),” Library of Congress, July 2012, https://www.loc.gov/rr/business/businesshistory/February/flint.html.

  Between 1934 and 1943, the proportion of the US workforce: Gerald Mayer, Union Membership Trends in the United States (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2004), https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/144981482.pdf.

  After signing the law, President Franklin D. Roosevelt: Leroy Chatfield, “How to Start a Union When You Don’t Have the Right,” Yes! Magazine, December 26, 2019, https://www.yesmagazine.org/economy/2019/12/26/union-farmer-how-to/.

  FBI statistics for the years 2017 through 2019: William Finnegan, “How Police Unions Fight Reform,” New Yorker, July 27, 2020, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/08/03/how-police-unions-fight-reform.

  Organized labor in the United States peaked: “Union Members Summary,” US Bureau of Labor Statistics, January 22, 2020, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm; Mayer, Union Membership Trends in the United States, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/144981482.pdf.

  Both trends are the direct result: Anna Stansbury and Lawrence Summers, “Declining Worker Power and American Economic Performance,” BPEA Conference Draft, Spring 2020.

  The writer Upton Sinclair summarized: Upton Sinclair, The Jungle (New York: Doubleday, Page & Co., 1906), chap. 10.

  An estimated one million rounds of ammunition: Evan Andrews, “The Battle of Blair Mountain,” History.com, September 1, 2018, https://www.history.com/news/americas-largest-labor-uprising-the-battle-of-blair-mountain.

  spent $1 million: Lynch, “How Did Workers Win the Right to Form a Union and Go on Strike?,” https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/166796; “CPI Inflation Calculator,” US Bureau of Labor Statistics, accessed July 2020, https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm.

  In the early 20th century, the American labor movement: Encyclopaedia Britannica Online, s.v. “Samuel Gompers,” accessed May 7, 2020, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Samuel-Gompers.

  In the first two decades after the war: Caleb Crain, “State of the Unions,” New Yorker, August 19, 2019, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/08/26/state-of-the-unions.

  As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. accurately put it: Peter Dreier, “This Labor Day, Remember That Martin Luther King’s Last Campaign Was for Workers’ Rights,” Huffington Post, September 4, 2017, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/this-labor-day-remember-that-martin-luther-kings_b_59ab51d4e4b0d0c16bb525a9.

  the proportion of income that went to the top 1 percent: “Top 1% National Income Share, USA, 1913–2018,” World Inequality Database, accessed May 2020, https://wid.world/country/usa/.

  corporate CEOs earned approximately $30: Lawrence Mishel and Julia Wolfe, “CEO Compensation Has Grown 940% since 1978,” Economic Policy Institute, August 14, 2019, https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-compensation-2018/.

  union members earn 15–25 percent: Henry S. Farber, Daniel Herbst, Ilyana Kuziemko, and Suresh Naidu, “Unions and Inequality over the Twentieth Century: New Evidence from Survey Data” (Working Paper 24587, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA, May 2018), https://www.nber.org/papers/w24587.pdf.

  When a quarter or more of an industry: Jake Rosenfeld, Patrick Denice, and Jennifer Laird, “Union Decline Lowers Wages of Nonunion Workers,” Economic Policy Institute, August 30, 2016, https://www.epi.org/publication/union-decline-lowers-wages-of-nonunion-workers-the-overlooked-reason-why-wages-are-stuck-and-inequality-is-growing/.


  as union membership in the United States has declined: Rosenfeld, Denice, and Laird, “Union Decline Lowers Wages of Nonunion Workers,” https://www.epi.org/publication/union-decline-lowers-wages-of-nonunion-workers-the-overlooked-reason-why-wages-are-stuck-and-inequality-is-growing/.

  In the summer of 1981: Andrew Glass, “Reagan Fires 11,000 Striking Air Traffic Controllers, Aug. 5, 1981,” Politico, August 5, 2017, https://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/05/reagan-fires-11-000-striking-air-traffic-controllers-aug-5-1981-241252.

  company management started simply replacing: Kathleen Schalch, “1981 Strike Leaves Legacy for American Workers,” NPR, August 3, 2006, https://www.npr.org/2006/08/03/5604656/1981-strike-leaves-legacy-for-american-workers.

  There were 234 strikes: “Work Stoppages Involving 1,000 or More Workers, 1947–2017,” US Bureau of Labor Statistics, February 9, 2018, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/wkstp.t01.htm.

  An early blow came in 1957: Crain, “State of the Unions,” https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/08/26/state-of-the-unions.

  More than two-thirds of the job creation: Manyika et al., The Social Contract in the 21st Century, https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Industries/Social Sector/Our Insights/The social contract in the 21st century/MGI-The-social-contract-in-the-21st-century-Full-report-final.pdf.

  A 2020 study by former Treasury secretary Larry Summers: Stansbury and Summers, “Declining Worker Power and American Economic Performance.”

  workers received an estimated eleven cents of every dollar: Stansbury and Summers, “Declining Worker Power and American Economic Performance.”

  only the United States experienced: Stansbury and Summers, “Declining Worker Power and American Economic Performance.”

  In September 2019, members of the United Auto Workers: Alexia Fernández Campbell, “The GM Strike Has Officially Ended. Here’s What Workers Won and Lost,” Vox, October 25, 2019, https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/10/25/20930350/gm-workers-vote-end-strike.

  only 57 percent voted to approve the contract: Eli Rosenberg, “UAW Members Approve New Contract with GM, Ending One of the Largest Strikes in Years,” Washington Post, October 25, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/10/25/gm-strike-is-nearly-over-workers-are-voting-contract/.

  UAW president Gary Jones resigned: Rosenberg, “UAW Members Approve New Contract with GM,” https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/10/25/gm-strike-is-nearly-over-workers-are-voting-contract/; Clifford Atiyeh, “Former UAW President Gary Jones Charged in Union Embezzlement Scandal,” Car and Driver, March 6, 2020, https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a31253503/uaw-embezzlement-scandal-gary-jones-arrest/.

  Just two months later, his predecessor: Michael Wayland, “Second Ex–United Auto Workers President Charged with Embezzling Union Funds,” CNBC, August 27, 2020, https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/27/second-ex-uaw-president-charged-with-embezzling-union-funds.html.

  earned a nearly $400,000 salary: “Salary Report—The $150K Club,” Teamsters for a Democratic Union, October 24, 2019, https://www.tdu.org/teamster_officer_salaries.

  Today, the AFL-CIO represents 12.7 million workers: “About Us,” AFL-CIO, 2020, accessed May 7, 2020, https://aflcio.org/about-us; “Our Unions and Allies,” AFL-CIO, 2020, accessed May 7, 2020, https://aflcio.org/about-us/our-unions-and-allies; “Union Members Summary,” https://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm.

  a seventeen-foot-tall, fifty-one-foot-wide: Michael Padwee, “Architectural Murals of Lumen Martin Winter,” Tiles in New York (blog), October 1, 2016, https://tilesinnewyork.blogspot.com/2016/10/architectural-murals-of-lumen-martin.html.

  where he worked through college: Daniel Malloy, “Trumka Puts AFL-CIO in Middle of Every Issue,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, October 24, 2010, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/nation/2010/10/24/Trumka-puts-AFL-CIO-in-middle-of-every-issue/stories/201010240203.

  pending legislation that would strengthen: Eli Rosenberg, “House Passes Bill to Rewrite Labor Laws and Strengthen Unions,” Washington Post, February 6, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/02/06/house-passes-bill-rewrite-labor-laws-strengthen-unions/.

  by 2028, researchers estimate: 2018 Skills Gap and Future of Work Study, Deloitte Insights and the Manufacturing Institute, accessed May 2020, https://operationalsolutions.nam.org/mi-skills-gap-study-18/.

  Today only 14 percent of British: Carl Roper, “Trade Union Membership Is Growing, but There’s Still Work to Do,” Trades Union Congress, May 31, 2018, https://www.tuc.org.uk/blogs/trade-union-membership-growing-there%E2%80%99s-still-work-do.

  These “alternative work arrangements” offer workers: David Weil and Tanya Goldman, “Labor Standards, the Fissured Workplace, and the On-Demand Economy,” Perspectives on Work 20 (2016), http://www.fissuredworkplace.net/assets/Weil_Goldman.pdf.

  They include nearly all the baggage handlers: Robert Silk, “Labor Unrest Grows as Airlines Outsource Jobs to Contractors,” Travel Weekly, July 15, 2019, https://www.travelweekly.com/Travel-News/Airline-News/Labor-unrest-grows-as-airlines-outsource-jobs-to-contractors; “Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements Summary,” table 8, US Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 7, 2018, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/conemp.nr0.htm; Mark Bergen and Josh Eidelson, “Inside Google’s Shadow Workforce,” Bloomberg, July 25, 2018, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-25/inside-google-s-shadow-workforce.

  The US Department of Labor reports: “Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements Summary,” https://www.bls.gov/news.release/conemp.nr0.htm.

  less than 2 percent of the US labor force: “Electronically Mediated Work: New Questions in the Contingent Worker Supplement,” Monthly Labor Review, US Bureau of Labor Statistics, September 2018, https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2018/article/electronically-mediated-work-new-questions-in-the-contingent-worker-supplement.htm; “How Many Gig Workers Are There?,” Gig Economy Data Hub, Aspen Institute Future of Work Initiative and Cornell University ILR School, https://www.gigeconomydata.org/basics/how-many-gig-workers-are-there.

  On August 22, 2017, more than one hundred: Marie Targonski-O’Brien, “Uber, Lyft Drivers Crowd LAX, Protest Low Pay,” KCET, August 22, 2017, https://www.kcet.org/shows/socal-connected/uber-lyft-drivers-crowd-lax-protest-low-pay.

  Between 2013 and 2017: “The Online Platform Economy in 2018: Drivers, Workers, Sellers, and Lessors,” JPMorgan Chase & Co. Institute, April 2019, https://institute.jpmorganchase.com/institute/research/labor-markets/report-ope-2018.htm.

  “Most of us as drivers”: Targonski-O’Brien, “Uber, Lyft Drivers Crowd LAX, Protest Low Pay,” https://www.kcet.org/shows/socal-connected/uber-lyft-drivers-crowd-lax-protest-low-pay.

  Like many other grassroots initiatives: Brian Dolber, interview with Jack Corrigan, May 25, 2020; Brian Dolber, interview with Will Peischel, May 15, 2020.

  With the help of a freelance developer: Noam Schreiber and Kate Conger, “Uber and Lyft Drivers Gain Labor Clout, with Help from an App,” New York Times, September 20, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/20/business/uber-lyft-drivers.html.

  Most adjunct faculty: “Average Adjunct Professor Salary,” PayScale, accessed May 20, 2020, https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Adjunct_Professor/Salary.

  about five hundred of the estimated three hundred thousand rideshare drivers: Brian Dolber, interview with Will Peischel, May 15, 2020; “About Us,” Rideshare Drivers United, accessed May 21, 2020, https://drivers-united.org/about.

  the group had recruited most of its members: Brian Dolber, From Independent Contractors to an Independent Union: Building Solidarity through Rideshare Drivers United’s Digital Organizing Strategy (Philadelphia, PA: Media, Inequality & Change Center, October 2019), 9, https://mic.asc.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Dolber_final1.pdf.

  Armed with an academic grant: Dolber, From Independent Contractors to an Independent Union, 9, https://mic.asc.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Dolber_final1.pdf.

  The strategy was simple: Brian Dolber, interview with Will Peischel, May 15, 2020.

/>   Between October 2018 and January 2019: Dolber, From Independent Contractors to an Independent Union, 9, https://mic.asc.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Dolber_final1.pdf.

  while technology can enable an organization: Brian Dolber, interview with Jack Corrigan, May 25, 2020.

  By March 25, 2019, Rideshare Drivers United: Alexia Fernández Campbell, “Thousands of Uber Drivers Are Striking in Los Angeles,” Vox, March 25, 2019, https://www.vox.com/2019/3/25/18280718/uber-lyft-drivers-strike-la-los-angeles; Bryce Covert, “‘It’s Not Right’: Why Uber and Lyft Drivers Went on Strike,” Vox, May 9, 2019, https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/5/9/18538206/uber-lyft-strike-demands-ipo.

  On May 8, 2019, days before Uber: Covert, “Why Uber and Lyft Drivers Went on Strike,” https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/5/9/18538206/uber-lyft-strike-demands-ipo; Ben Chapman, “Uber Drivers in UK Cities Go on Strike in Protest over Pay and Workers’ Rights,” Independent, May 7, 2019, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/uber-drivers-strike-london-birmingham-glasgow-nottingham-pay-rights-a8898791.html.

  On May 10, its first day: Lucinda Shen, “Uber Is One of the Worst Performing IPOs Ever,” Fortune, May 10, 2019, https://fortune.com/2019/05/10/uber-ipo-worst-performing-percentage/; Danielle Abril, “Lyft Stock Tumbles Two Days after Its IPO,” Fortune, April 1, 2019, https://fortune.com/2019/04/01/lyft-stock-drops-after-ipo/.

  There are real changes that can be enacted: Rideshare Drivers United homepage, accessed May 21, 2020, https://drivers-united.org/.

  Uber has more than 3.9 million drivers: “Company Info,” Uber, accessed May 21, 2020, https://www.uber.com/newsroom/company-info/; Steve Minter, “Who Are the World’s Biggest Employers?” IndustryWeek, June 24, 2015, https://www.industryweek.com/talent/article/21965429/who-are-the-worlds-biggest-employers.

  “There has to be”: Dara Khosrowshahi, “I Am the C.E.O. of Uber. Gig Workers Deserve Better,” New York Times, August 10, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/opinion/uber-ceo-dara-khosrowshahi-gig-workers-deserve-better.html%20?.