Lessons from the Black Working Class: Foreshadowing America's Economic Health

by Lori Latrice Martin, Hayward Derrick Horton, Teresa A. Booker

Overview

This book enables readers to better understand, explain, and predict the future of the nation's overall economic health through its examination of the black working class—especially the experiences of black women and black working-class residents outside of urban areas.

How have the experiences of black working-class women and men residing in urban, suburban, and rural settings impacted U.S. labor relations and the broader American society? This book asserts that a comprehensive and critical examination of the black working class can be used to forecast whether economic troubles are on the horizon. It documents how the increasing incidence of attacks on unions, the dwindling availability of working-class jobs, and the clamoring by the working class for a minimum wage hike is proof that the atmospheric pressure in America is rising, and that efforts to prepare for the approaching financial storm require attention to the individuals and households who are often overlooked: the black working class.

Presenting information of great importance to sociologists, political scientists, and economists, the authors of this work explore the impact of the recent Great Recession on working-class African Americans and argue that the intersections of race and class for this particular group uncover the state of equity and justice in America. This book will also be of interest to public policymakers as well as students in graduate-level courses in the areas of African American studies, American society and labor, labor relations, labor and the Civil Rights Movement, and studies on race, class, and gender.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781440841439
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	10/21/2015
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.40(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Lori Latrice Martin, PhD, is associate professor of sociology and African and African American studies at Louisiana State University.

Hayward Derrick Horton, PhD, is professor of sociology at University at Albany, State University of New York.

Teresa A. Booker, PhD, is assistant professor of Africana studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.