Animals play an indispensable role in the lives of humans, shaping our psychological development, supporting livelihoods, and driving global economic systems. Indeed, a child’s early cognitive education is scientifically incomplete without learning about animals. Humane aquatic farming provides 500 million people in developing countries enough money to live another day. Animal pollination services contribute upwards […]
Tag: labor
The UAW is Redefining What It Means to be a Blue Collar Worker
What does it mean to be a worker in America? This is the fundamental question at the heart of the United Auto Workers’ strike. On September 15 the UAW made history by simultaneously striking each of the Big Three auto manufacturers: Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis. The move comes off the back of Shawn Fain […]
The Democratic Party is Untenable
The United States stands at the precipice of so many crises that I cannot hope to list them all here. We seem intent to drive straight off the cliff of imminent climate catastrophe. Our healthcare and education systems balloon in costs, run by and for profit-seeking middlemen rather than the interests of the people that […]
Bigger than Baseball: An Endless Lockout, The Labor Movement, and America’s National Pastime
On December 2nd, 2021, something strange happened. Major League Baseball scrubbed player faces, highlight reels and other media from its website. Where videos of iconic Yankees once stood, the only thing visible now was a letter from the commissioner of the MLB, Rob Manfred. The reason? The Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) between the owners of […]
Japanese menstrual leave policy: The road to menstrual equity?
In 2016, Alisha Coleman, a Georgia woman working as a 911 operator, was fired from her job after leaving menstrual blood on her office chair twice due to her menopause. As a result of the incident, Coleman and the ACLU sued her former employer for unlawful workplace discrimination. Currently, there is no federal law in […]
Stronger than Steel: A Small Alabama Town, The Richest Man in the World and the Future of the Labor Movement
Twenty minutes south of Birmingham, just up the road from a state park, lies the town of Bessemer, Alabama. Termed the “Marvel City” for its industrial prowess, and named for the British inventor who created the famous steelmaking process, Bessemer has since fallen on hard times. Deindustrialization gutted the region, and more than 27 percent […]
Farmworkers: Victims of COVID-19 and Climate Change
Farmworkers are a crucial sector of the labor force who often go without praise. Despite the harsh working conditions, low wages and the increasing threat of climate change, farmworkers are putting their lives even more at risk during the global pandemic. Farmworkers serve an essential purpose in our society as the backbone of our food […]
American Public Transportation: Failures to Modernize
Ideally, a public transportation system is an economical and environmental alternative to driving cars, as it lightens the burden of congestion in mega-cities like Los Angeles and New York City and reduces carbon emissions. It also balances social and geographic inequality by providing an affordable alternative to those who cannot afford to own and operate […]
Modern Day Indentured Servitude
Lakshmi Senthilnathan has spent most of her adult life working in the country of Oman as the sole breadwinner of her family. While telling her story, she breezes past several accounts of physical and sexual abuse, claiming they are not out of the ordinary. Lakshmi persuades the interviewer that she was fortunate, for some of […]
The Elusive Lesson of Birmingham
In a CNN opinion piece, Democrats, Please Learn from Birmingham, Bakari Seller argues that engaging black voters rather than white working-class voters should be the Democratic party’s main strategy in the upcoming elections. Seller backs his argument with the Alabama Senate 2017 election between Roy Moore and Doug Jones, which demonstrated the power of black voter […]