The Betrayal of Work: How Low-Wage Jobs Fail 35 Million Americans and Their Families

Reminiscent of Barbara Ehrenreich's best-selling Nickel and Dimed, Beth Shulman's The Betrayal of Work offers a compelling and disturbing portrait of poverty in the American workplace. An author and labor lawyer, Shulman traveled the country talking to a variety of Americans working in low-wage jobs that offer little hope for anything better. These are the 35 million people who live by the American work ethic—paying taxes and doing their jobs with care and dedication but getting little or nothing in return in the way of benefits. Their situations dispel the American myth of economic and social mobility, she argues. But readers will not be left without hope for this marginalized segment of the workforce. Betrayal of Work concludes with a chapter that specifically outlines how structural changes in the economy may be achieved, thus expanding opportunities for all Americans.