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Women hold up more than half the sky: The Forty-First Newsletter (2021)
Indian peasants and agricultural workers remain in the midst of a country-wide agitation sparked by the proposal of three farm bills that were then signed into law by the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party government in September 2020.
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The condition of the working class
Everything changes and yet everything stays the same.
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In historic vote, 60,000 Hollywood workers authorize first ever countrywide strike
Workers employed in major film and television production houses have complained of abysmal working conditions such as long hours, often exceeding 12 hours a day, low wages and low healthcare contributions from producers.
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Pandemic economic woes continue, but so do deep structural problems, especially the long-term growth in the share of low wage jobs
Many are understandably alarmed about what the September 4th termination of several special federal pandemic unemployment insurance programs will mean for millions of workers.
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The Pasts and Futures of Social Reproduction as Dual Terrains Struggle
This article discusses Susan Ferguson’s Women and Work and how it advances contemporary debates about social reproduction within and beyond Marxist feminism. In particular, I emphasise its call for avoiding hierarchising struggles against oppression and those against exploitation, and for centring a dual-terrains approach. – Maud Perrier
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10 charts on the State of U.S. workers on the 2nd pandemic Labor Day
While workers are continuing to struggle under Covid, corporate lobbyists are converging on Capitol Hill to block proposed pro-labor reforms.
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China’s top court says grueling ‘996’ work schedule illegal
The Supreme People’s Court published a set of labor-related disputes to clarify legal standards of working hours and overtime wages.
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Workers refuse to shoulder the burden for the bosses’ climate crisis
The United Nations issued a “code red for humanity” warning earlier this month with over 3,000 pages of scientific documentation saying that the climate crisis has reached a point where we can expect extreme weather including heat waves, flooding and droughts to happen with more frequency and intensity.
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Chip wars or the crisis of late capitalism?
If the U.S. wants to be a world leader, it has to match China in investing in knowledge generation for future technology. Why then is the U.S. taking the sanctions route? Sanctions are simpler to implement; building a society that values knowledge is much more difficult. This is the crisis of late capitalism.
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The case of the vanishing boss
This article summarizes the manuscript, “The Two-Employer Problem: Strategic Dilemmas at the Heart of the Tipped Wage Debate,” a co-winner of the 2021 Albert Szymanski-T.R. Young/Critical Sociology Marxist Sociology Graduate Student Paper Award.
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Playing the capitalist game: heads they win, tails you lose
According to an Economic Policy Institute report, between 28 and 47 percent of U.S. private sector workers are subject to noncompete agreements.
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Relative surplus value: The class struggle intensifies
For any working period—whether it be a day, an hour, or five minutes—part of the period is “necessary labor” and another part is “surplus labor.”
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A working class perspective on China’s tech regulations
Bourgeois pundits are alarmed by the Chinese government’s latest regulatory changes. A Wall Street Journal headline is typical: “China’s corporate crackdown is just getting started. Signs point to more tumult ahead.”
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Workers take over a Kellogg factory, now known as ‘Socialist Kellogg’
In the worker-controlled Venezuelan Kellogg factory, you see the workers working diligently to make corn flake and sugary cereals in a new package displaying the Venezuelan flag and the words “Together for Venezuela.”
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United States: Activision workers walk out against sexist oppression
For years, a toxic culture of rampant sexism has permeated Activision Blizzard, the video game development company behind titles including World of Warcraft and Call of Duty.
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Sex workers and COVID-19: Resisting the pandemic and criminalization
Georgina Orellano, secretary-general of the Association of Women Sex Workers of Argentina (AMMAR), says that “the pandemic has highlighted the inequality” in society and deepened the problems faced by sex workers. Sex work, which is not recognized in Argentina, has become more precarious, she says.
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How labor can win at the bargaining table
A new report from Berkeley is a rare piece of good news for American labor—and a bracing reminder of what real organizing looks like.
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Shoplifting is big news; stealing millions from workers is not
Urban crime is the golden child of local media, as recent FAIR coverage (6/21/21) has shown. But as FAIR’s Julie Hollar recently noted, the amount of attention given to a topic does not always reflect the seriousness of the situation.
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China and the supply chain: a comment on the June 2021 White House review
Contrary to rhetoric from Democrats and Republicans, the U.S. has an economic interest in trade and peace with China
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Imperialism, Migrant Labor, and the Nation: The Canadian Example
By centering “human capital” and providing more pathways to work and residency for higher-skilled migrants, despite lower-skilled migrant workers having a far greater desire to temporarily migrate and permanently settle, Canada is able to continually reap the benefits of both high-skilled and low-skilled labor without having to socially reproduce either.