Thursday, July 23, 2020

Uncovering what is essential


Erudite Partner has written at length about how the pandemic is reshaping our economic lives:

Until an effective vaccine for the coronavirus becomes available, expect to see the emergence of a three-tier system of worker immiseration: low-paid essential workers who must leave home to do their jobs, putting themselves in significant danger in the process, while we all depend on them for sustenance; better paid people who toil at home, but whose employers will expect their hours of availability to expand to fill the waking day; and low-paid or unpaid domestic laborers, most of them women, who keep everyone else fed, clothed, and comforted.

Read it all at Tom Dispatch.

2 comments:

Celia said...

My eldest son is down with Covid caught at work doing QC in a frozen food plant, just above minimum wage. And yes, all those women keeping other people's lives together.

janinsanfran said...

Celia: I am so sad to hear your son is among those who have gotten ill. His work was certainly essential! I've had a couple of friends and one relative who caught COVID -- I guess by now many of us know someone who got sick. Hope your son gets well soon.