Critics on the left and the right typically agree that globalization, the loss of manufacturing jobs, and the expansion of the service sector have led to income inequality and rising numbers of low-paying jobs with poor working conditions.In Degraded Work, Marc Doussard demonstrates that this decline in wages and working conditions is anything but the unavoidable result of competitive economic forces. Rather, he makes the case that service sector and other local-serving employers have boosted profit with innovative practices to exploit workers, demeaning their jobs in new ways—denying safety equipment, fining workers for taking scheduled breaks, requiring unpaid overtime—that go far beyond wage cuts. Doussard asserts that the degradation of service work is a choice rather than an inevitability, and he outlines concrete steps that can be taken to help establish a fairer postindustrial labor market.Drawing on fieldwork in Chicago, Degraded Work examines changes in two industries in which inferior job quality is assumed to be intrinsic: residential construction and food retail. In both cases, Doussard shows how employers degraded working conditions as part of a successful and intricate strategy to increase profits. Arguing that a growing service sector does not have to mean growing inequality, Doussard proposes creative policy and organizing opportunities that workers and advocates can use to improve job quality despite the overwhelming barriers to national political action.

In an attempt to understand the lives of Americans earning near-minimum wages, the author works as a waitress in Florida, a cleaning woman in Maine, and a sales clerk in Minnesota.

The American Dream used to include a white picket fence, 2.2 kids, and a dog. In todayÕs frantic world, itÕs . . . well, letÕs be honestÑitÕs quite different. But what would happen if you did have the nerve to quit your white-collar job? Prioleau Alexander can tell you: He walked away from a lucrative career as an advertising executive, seeking a life Òlike that dude on Kung Fu.Ó Over the next year he worked minimum-wage jobs as a pizza deliveryman, ice cream scooper, construction worker, ER tech, fast food jockey, and even cowboy on a Montana dude ranch. In YOU WANT FRIES WITH THAT?, Prioleau explores life at minimum wage and proves unequivocally that the grass is not always greener on the other side.