Declining Cities, Declining Unions: Urban Sprawl and U.S. Inequality
Cities offer the natural solidarities of work and neighborhood that make sustained organizing possible. Their decline spells disaster for American labor.
Winter 2025
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Belabored Podcast #66: Seeing Red on Black Friday
For Black Friday, Belabored talks to a Walmart labor activist and learns about a recent investigation into Walmart’s tax dodging. Plus: Ferguson #NotOneDime boycott, Obama’s executive action on immigration, the port truckers’ strike, and more.
Port Truck Drivers on Strike! A Dispatch from Two of the Nation’s Largest Ports
On Thursday, November 13, port truckers struck at the nation’s largest ports, Los Angeles and Long Beach, demanding an end to misclassification and wage theft. It was the fourth strike in a campaign initiated by the Teamsters and Change to …
Belabored #65: Inside the Motor City’s Economic Crash
Belabored talked to Michael Mulholland, president of the utilities union AFSCME Local 207 in Detroit, about last week’s financial deal, the impact on union workers, and the political forces driving what he calls a manufactured financial crisis.
Philadelphia to Corporate Ed Reformers: No Contract, No Peace
In a move that sets a worrying precedent for labor–management relations across the country, Philadelphia’s School Reform Commission (SRC), a five-member unelected school governing board, stunned the city on October 6 when it announced that its members had unilaterally decided …
Bartlebys All!
Few institutions have offered themselves as less promising for the novelist than the modern office. And yet…
Belabored Podcast #62: The Unfinished History of Labor Feminism
This week, Belabored is all about labor feminism, with Feminism Unfinished authors Dorothy Sue Cobble, Linda Gordon, and Astrid Henry. Plus: labor joins the protests in Hong Kong, college students take on Teach for America, and more.
Decline of the Strike 
A new edition of Jeremy Brecher’s classic Strike reminds readers of the sheer size, violence, and power of labor struggles now erased from American historical consciousness .
Belabored Podcast #61: When Climate and Labor Converge (Live!), with Nastaran Mohit and Lara Skinner
Is real economic and environmental sustainability still achievable? How do you tackle capitalism and climate change simultaneously? Belabored, in its first ever live recording, asks Nastaran Mohit, Lara Skinner, and guests.
Belabored Podcast #60: Whither Market Basket? with James Green
Is the outcome of the Market Basket strike a victory for working people, or something more complicated? Belabored asks James Green, a former professor at the University of Massachusetts at Boston and the author of several books on labor history and social movements. Plus: care workers mobilizing across the country, pre-K workers and inequality in New York, and more.
Belabored Podcast #59: Labor Rights as Civil Rights, with Moshe Marvit
Is the right to form a union also a civil right? Belabored asks Moshe Marvit, who recently helped turn the idea into legislation now pending in Congress. Plus: “crowd work,” Ferguson, unionizing Elmos, and why we need a four-hour workday.
Unite Queer
Out in the Union, a new book by Miriam Frank, shows that unions have been crucial to the growth and success of the modern LGBT rights movement.
Belabored Podcast #57: Organizing the South, with Ben Speight
This week, Belabored talks to Ben Speight, a veteran organizer with Teamsters 728 in Georgia, about building the labor movement in the South. Plus: transgender discrimination at Hobby Lobby, teachers supporting postal workers, and why workers should have a say in who runs the company.
Belabored Podcast #56: The Post–Harris v. Quinn Future
What does Harris v. Quinn mean for home care workers, for other public sector workers, and for any of us who care about labor? Belabored asks Harvard Law professor Benjamin Sachs and Minnesota care worker Sumer Spika. Plus: strikes in California and Greece, labor struggles at the opera, and more.
Prison to Table: The Other Side of the Whole Foods Experience
It’s not clear what shocked people most about the report in Fortune that Whole Foods Market sells goat cheese and tilapia prepared with prison labor—the horrendous exploitation of prisoners for a base rate less than one-tenth of Whole Foods’ starting …
