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Producing Poverty: The Public Cost of Low-Wage Production Jobs in Manufacturing

Ken Jacobs, Zohar Perla, Ian Perry and Dave Graham-Squire UC Berkeley Labor Center
Much attention has been given in recent years to low-wage work in the fast-food industry, big-box retail, and other service sector industries in the U.S. The rise of low-wage business models in the service sector has often been contrasted to business models of the past, when blue collar jobs in the manufacturing industry supported a large middle class in the U.S. Recent research found that manufacturing production wages now rank in the bottom half of all jobs in the U.S.

Spring Training for the Next Wave of Food Activists

Brian Massey Civil Eats
The food activist group, Eco Practicum, came together for five days in New York City for the third annual program produced in partnership with Our Name Is Farm, a training aimed at building “effective advocacy for a better food system.”

Americans Don't Miss Manufacturing - They Miss Unions

Ben Casselman FiveThirtyEight
On average, manufacturing jobs still pay better than most jobs available to people without a college degree. But there isn't anything special about manufacturing that made it a source of good living wage jobs for so many decades. The real reason why some terrible manufacturing jobs became good jobs is simple: unions. We may not bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. in large numbers, but we can work to revitalize and rebuild unions.

The Good Wife: Florrick v. the Sisterhood

MEGAN GARBER The Atlantic
The CBS drama’s dramatic finale brought a sad but fitting end to a show that has always been a little bit awkward about its female friendships.

Burying the White Working Class

Connor Kilpatrick Jacobin
Liberal condescension towards white workers is code for a broader anti-working class agenda.

TUG OF WAR: Foreign Fire

William Shakespeare adapted and directed by Barbara Gaines Broadway World Chicago / Chicago Shakespeare Theater
In launching a cycle of plays grounded in English history, Shakespeare was able to show his audiences the blood-soaked story of their own becoming, the history of their creation as a nation. (From an American vantage, it would be as though a present-day playwright were to track our history from Jamestown to World War II, focusing most intently on the span stretching from the Revolutionary through the Civil Wars.

Snowden Interview: Why the Media Isn't Doing Its Job

Edward Snowden, Emily Bell Columbia Journalism Review
There’s an argument that was put forth by an earlier journalist, I.F. Stone: “All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed.” In my experience, this is absolutely a fact.

Children in Farm Communities Pay Dearly for the Food We Eat

Elizabeth Grossman Civil Eats
Citing an alarming increase in the incidence of childhood cancers and neurological disorders, the Pesticide Action Network’s new study concludes pesticide use is having a devastating impact on the health of children in agricultural communities. A child’s growing body is particularly vulnerable to the harms of pesticide exposure. Yet, according to the report, children in agriculture communities are being exposed to a “double dose” of pesticides.