The Next Shift: The Fall of Industry and the Rise of Health Care in Rust Belt America

ISBN: 0674292197

Author: Winant, Gabriel

Condition: New

Winner of the Frederick Jackson Turner AwardWinner of the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial PrizeWinner of the C. L. R. James AwardA New York Times Book Review Editors ChoiceA ProMarket Best Political Economy Book of the YearThe Next Shift is an original work of serious scholarship, but its also vivid and readableEye-opening.-Jennifer Szalai, New York TimesA deeply upsetting bookWinant ably blends social and political history with conventional labor history to construct a remarkably comprehensive narrative with clear contemporary implications.-Scott W. Stern, New RepublicTerrificA useful guide to the sweeping social changes that have shaped a huge segment of the economy and created the dystopian world of contemporary service-sector work.-Nelson Lichtenstein, The NationPittsburgh was once synonymous with steel, but today most of its mills are gone. Like so many places across the United States, a city that was a center of blue-collar manufacturing is now dominated by health care, which employs more Americans than any other industry. Gabriel Winant takes us inside the Rust Belt to show how Americas cities have weathered new economic realities.As steelworkers and their families grew older, they required more health care. Even as the industrial economy contracted sharply, the care economy thrived. But unlike their blue-collar predecessors, home health aides and hospital staff work unpredictable hours for low pay. Today health care workers-mostly women and people of color-are on the front lines of our most pressing crises, yet we have been slow to appreciate that they are the face of our twenty-first-century workforce. The Next Shift offers unique insights into how we got here and what could happen next.