Working People

Latest Episodes:

Mini-cast: On the Clock (w/ Emily Guendelsberger) Jul 12, 2019

Show notes

We chat with journalist Emily Guendelsberger about her new book, On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane.

Additional links/info below...

Emily's Twitter page
Emily Guendelsberger, Little, Brown, On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

"You Are Not A Loan" (w/ Ami Schneider & Sanders Fabares) Jun 30, 2019

Show notes

Last Monday, Representatives Ilhan Omar, Pramila Jayapal, and Senator Bernie Sanders unveiled the Student Debt Cancellation Act of 2019, which includes a plan to wipe out the $1.6 trillion in student debt held by 45 million Americans. In this this special episode, we talk to Ami Schneider and Sanders Fabares, two debt holders and graduates from the for-profit Art Institute college chain who decided to fight back and get involved in anti-debt organizing through the Debt Collective.

Additional links/info below...

The Debt Collective website, Facebook page, and Twitterpage
Lucy Diavolo, Teen Vogue, "Bernie Sanders Teamed Up With Ilhan Omar and Pramila Jayapal on a Plan to Cancel All Student Loan Debt"
Astra Taylor, The Guardian, "Free College and Debt Forgiveness Are Within Our Grasp. Don't Settle for Less"
Sarah Jaffe, The Washington Post, "The People Power Behind Sanders's Debt Cancellation Plan"
Marshall Steinbaum, Current Affairs, "Is Student Debt Cancellation Regressive? NO"
Sparky Abraham, Current Affairs, "How Student Debt Is Worsening Gender and Racial Injustice"
Casey Quinlan, ThinkProgress, "Why Graduates Of For-Profit Colleges Are Struggling To Pay Back Student Loans"
Tressie McMillan Cottom, The New Press, Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy
Alex Shebanow, Fail State (documentary)

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

What to Do if ICE Raids Your Workplace (w/ Diana Marin & Bill Lopez) Jun 22, 2019

Show notes

In this urgent special episode, we talk with Diana Marin, Supervising Attorney at the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, and Professor Bill Lopez about what to do if ICE raids your workplace. We discuss what precautions individuals, families, and communities must take in anticipation of a possible raid, what you should do if a raid occurs at your work, and what the impacts of these raids are.

NOTE: We are working to get this episode transcribed and translated into multiple languages. If you can assist us with this, please reach out (we will pay for your work, of course)

Additional links/info below...

Diana's staff page at the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center
Michigan Immigrant Rights Center website, Resources page, and Twitter page
Bill's faculty page and Twitter page
Bill Lopez, Johns Hopkins University Press, Separated: Family and Community in the Aftermath of an Immigration Raid
Washtenaw Interfaith Coalition for Immigrant Rights
Immigration Advocates Network
ICE Raid Resources
Sarah Mervosh, The New York Times, "Immigration Authorities Arrest More Than 280 in Texas in Largest Workplace Raid in a Decade"
Nick Miroff, Washington Post, "ICE Raids Targeting Migrant Families Slated to Start Sunday in Major U.S. Cities"

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

Mini-cast: Mad about Class (w/ Lyta Gold) Jun 12, 2019

Show notes

We chat with Current Affairs Amusements and Managing Editor, Lyta Gold, about her latest viral tweet and about why upper-middle-class liberals get so mad when you talk about class.

Additional links/info below...

Lyta's Twitter page
THE tweet
Current Affairs website, Facebook page, and Twitter page

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

Erin Fristad Jun 07, 2019

Show notes

We wrap up Season Two by chatting with Erin Fristad. Erin is currently an adjunct professor at a community college and she works with combat veterans as an equine therapy specialist. She is also a writer and she worked in the commercial fishing industry around Alaska for many years. We talk about her time as a commercial fisherwoman, how she ended up there, what sort of jobs she did, and what sort of people she worked with. We also talk about the FisherPoets Gathering, where members of the commercial fishing community come together once a year to share their stories. And we talk about what it's meant for Erin to find and express her own voice as a writer and a worker, and about what it's meant for her to be able to teach others to do the same.

Additional links/info below...

Erin's website
The FisherPoets Gathering website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
Chris Collision, Pacific Standard, "When Commercial Fishermen Get Together to Recite Poetry"

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"
Ayla Nereo, "Waves"

Mini-cast: A People's History (w/ David Parsons) Jun 03, 2019

Show notes

Our friend David Parsons from The Nostalgia Trap podcast comes back on the show to talk about their exciting new video project, left media, and about the importance of telling history a different way.

Additional links/info below...

The Nostalgia Trap website, Twitter page, and Patreon page
David's Twitter page

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

ORGANIZE! - Democratic Socialists of America, Part I - Jen Jun 01, 2019

Show notes

We are excited to launch our new ORGANIZE! series. In this ongoing series, we'll be talking to working people who have had enough of this rigged system and who have taken it upon themselves to band together and fight back. In a world where so many avenues for political change have just been swallowed up, colonized, and defanged by the ruling class, we want to see where working-class folks are turning. From the Poor People's Campaign to the Catholic Worker Movement, from labor unions to the Carolina Workers Collective, from radical indigenous collectives to the Sunrise Movement … we want to see what organizations workers are joining, or building from the ground up. We want to talk about the campaigns they're launching and the battles they are waging to claim a better future for working people everywhere.

To kick off our ORGANIZE! series, we're going to talk to folks who have found a home and a cause worth fighting for in the Democratic Socialists of America. In Part I we talk to Jen from the DSA-Eugene chapter in Oregon. We talk about growing up poor and the life-saving power of communal solidarity. We also talk about what brought Jen to DSA and about the organizing work that she and the other members of DSA-Eugene are doing.

Additional links/info below...

The Democratic Socialists of America website, Facebook page, and Twitterpage
DSA-Eugene Facebook page and Twitter page
Jen's Twitter page

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

Mini-cast: This Is Not a Rescue (w/ Kaytlin Bailey) May 27, 2019

Show notes

Friend of the show Kaytlin Bailey is back to tell us about the work she's doing at Decriminalize Sex Work and about the hysterical, disastrous push by legislators in Florida to further criminalize sex workers.

Additional links/info below...

Kaytlin's website and Twitter page
Decriminalize Sex Work website and Twitter page
SWOP USA website and Twitter page
SWOP Behind Bars website and Twitter page
EJ Dickson, Rolling Stone, "Prosecutors Say There's No Evidence of Sex Trafficking In Robert Kraft Case"
Natasha Lennard, The Intercept, "Florida Is Poised to Create an Anti-"Trafficking" Registry That Will Inevitably Hurt Sex Workers"

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"

Care for One Another & Fight Like Hell (w/ Arielle Cohen) May 25, 2019

Show notes

Activist Arielle Cohen shares her abortion story and some words of wisdom to guide us through these dark times.

Additional links/info below...

Arielle's Twitter page
National Network of Abortion Funds website and Twitter page
Planned Parenthood Action website and Twitter page
The Yellowhammer Fund website and Twitter page
Center for Reproductive Rights website and Twitter page
The National Women's Health Network website and Twitter page
We Testify: Our Abortion Stories website and Twitter page

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"
In Closing, "Days Past"
Movie Theater, "To Smoke a Cigarette"
Chad Crouch, "Arctic"

Walter Vicente May 19, 2019

Show notes

We chat with Walter Vicente, a Guatemalan immigrant and textile worker in North Carolina. But Walter isn't just a worker … he is also a proud co-owner at a worker co-op called Opportunity Threads, a cut-and-sew factory in Morganton, North Carolina. As it says on the Opportunity Threads website: "Everyone in our plant is hired with the expectation of becoming a worker-owner. Worker-ownership means that if a worker stays on at Opportunity Threads they are given the opportunity to be an owner in the company... Ultimately the workers themselves and their families are the beneficiaries of the success and growth of this business."

Opportunity Threads also distinguishes itself by the fact that most of the workers there are Mayan immigrants who are part of a vibrant community known as the Maya of Morganton. Together, they are showing that another, more just, more humane, and more communal and equitable mode of production and commerce is possible … one that puts workers and communities first.

Additional links/info below...

Opportunity Threads FAQ
Leon Fink, UNC Press, The Maya of Morganton: Work and Community in the Nuevo New South
Cecilia Garza, Yes!, "A North Carolina Textile Co-Op Gives Immigrant Workers a Stake in the Business"
Astra Taylor, What Is Democracy?
Maximillian Alvarez, The Baffler, "Wrestling with the Demo(n)s"

Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)

Lobo Loco, "Malte Junior - Hall"
The Cedro Willie Band, "Moving On"

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