Menu
Idea

labor

1005
Filter by:

Filter by published date

Viewing 31–60 of 1005 results. Go to first page
An anti-capitalist political cartoon depicting a capitalist rhinoceros blocking the tracks for a train of the people.

How Capitalism Survives

According to John Cassidy’s century-spanning history "Capitalism and Its Critics," the system lives on because of its antagonists.
by Erik Baker via The Nation on September 24, 2025
Four men model two-button suits of 1963 Paris.

The Economic, Political, and Cultural History of Menswear

Where Western men’s clothing traditions came from, how they have evolved, and how they're being continually reinterpreted.
by Derek Guy, Dennis M. Hogan via Jacobin on September 18, 2025
Illustration of Henry Ford looking evil holding a town in his hand standing in a factory.

We’re Living in the World Henry Ford Built

Ford was a raving bigot and a tyrant who wanted complete control over his workers. Ford is a perfect example of why rich capitalists should not run the world.
by Nathan J. Robinson via Current Affairs on September 15, 2025
Apple Company store in Chongqing, China.

How American Tech Made China an Economic Superpower

"Apple in China" tells the incredible story of China’s industrial development through the lens of America’s most iconic tech giant.
by Daniel Cheng via Damage on September 9, 2025
A mother talks to a welfare worker in 1958.

Hidden Casualties

Why women disproportionately make up the ranks of local government workers responsible for assessing requests for welfare support.
by Alycia Asai via Nursing Clio on August 27, 2025
Collage of Donald Trump, a slaughterhouse, and the book "The Jungle".

We Never Left Upton Sinclair’s Jungle

In 1905, Upton Sinclair documented the horrors in America’s slaughterhouses and meatpacking plants. In 2025, Donald Trump is making them worse.
by Chance Phillips via Current Affairs on August 7, 2025
A Farm Security Administration representative visits Seabrook Farms in New Jersey in May 1938.

Destiny of the Dispossessed Spinach Prince

John Seabrook’s history of Seabrook Farms, where many incarcerated Japanese Americans worked during WWII, is ultimately about fathers and sons.
by Nick Ripatrazone via The Bulwark on July 25, 2025
New York skyline viewed from the top of the Woolworth building, 1913.

A Brief History of New York’s First Great Architectural Firm

On the eccentric, creative minds behind McKim, Meade and White.
by Henry Wiencek via Literary Hub on July 22, 2025
A former coal miner works at a computer station at the Bit Source LLC office in Pikeville, Kentucky

The Rise and Fall of the Knowledge Worker

Knowledge workers, were supposed to be the beneficiaries of neoliberalism and globalization until AI and a hypercompetitive employment market.
by Vinit Ravishankar, Mostafa Abdou via Jacobin on July 10, 2025
Color lithograph advertisement showing the interior of a Pullman dining-car, with the Pullman factory out the window, 1894.
partner

Walking the Race Line on the Train Line

Investigators never reached a conclusion about the death of Pullman porter J. H. Wilkins, but his killing revealed much about the dangers of his profession.
by Matthew Wills, Rosemary Pearce via JSTOR Daily on June 21, 2025
Cover of book. Red text on a blue background with stickers of Karl Marx's face arranged like the 50 stars.

Marx: The Fourth Boom

Were you to vanish Marx from every library, you’d destroy the central interlocutor around which most of capitalism is built.
by Devin Thomas O’Shea via Los Angeles Review of Books on May 27, 2025
Amon Msane speaks at a press conference outside the 3M plant in Freehold, New Jersey, surrounded by leaders of OCAW Local 8-760. Stanley Fischer (beard, sunglasses) stands beside Msane, 1986. (Courtesy of Stanley Fischer)

When South African Unionists Struck for US Workers

In 1986, black workers in apartheid South Africa walked off the job in support of New Jersey unionists; marking a rare moment of international labor solidarity.
by Jeff Schuhrke via Jacobin on May 20, 2025
Karl Marx gazing off into the distance while surrounded by books

Karl Marx’s Legacy in the United States

For two centuries, Karl Marx’s thoughts have significantly impacted US politics. In turn, his close study of the US informed the development of his ideas.
by Andrew Hartman, Cal Turner, Sara Van Horn via Jacobin on May 18, 2025
Cattle in pens in Chicago in 1947.

The Industry that Stayed

How meatpacking remained domestic.
by Christopher Deutsch via Clio and the Contemporary on May 12, 2025
Mexican men in line for work in the Bracero program.
partner

What the World War II-Era Bracero Program Reveals About U.S. Immigration Debates

Efforts to restrict immigration have long coexisted with — and even reinforced — the nation's economic reliance on Mexican laborers.
via Retro Report on May 9, 2025
Mark Twain

The Impossible Contradictions of Mark Twain

Populist and patrician, hustler and moralist, salesman and satirist, he embodied the tensions within his America, and ours.
by Lauren Michele Jackson via The New Yorker on April 28, 2025
Political cartoon of men chopping down the tree of slavery.

The Root and The Branch: Working-Class Reform and Antislavery, 1790–1860

On the robust influence of labor reform and antislavery ideas and movements on each other from the early National period to the Civil War.
by Rosemary Fuerer, Sean Griffin via LaborOnline on April 9, 2025
A group of women textile workers outside of their boarding house.
partner

Lowell’s Forgotten House Mothers

As vital to the success of industrial New England as the mill girls who toiled in the factories were the women who oversaw their lodging.
by Sarah Buchmeier via JSTOR Daily on April 2, 2025
Train emerging from the Hoosac Tunnel, 1911.

The Hoosac Tunnel

A history of the Bloody Pit.
by John Bulmer via Restoration Obscura on March 29, 2025
Book Cover of "An Ordinary White."

Basic Stuff About Reality

On David Roediger’s “An Ordinary White: My Antiracist Education.”
by Devin Thomas O’Shea via Los Angeles Review of Books on March 28, 2025
The Inspection Room at Ellis Island in New York circa 1910.
partner

The History of Categorizing Immigrants as Either Good or Bad

In the 19th century, debates about contract workers sorted immigrants into "natural" and "unnatural" categories.
by Hidetaka Hirota via Made By History on March 26, 2025
Women working at the Social Security Administration in Baltimore, Maryland, 1937.

Women’s Work: Section 213 and the Women Fired from the Federal Government

In 1932, married women were among the first targets in a campaign to reduce federal spending and balance the budget.
by Tanya L. Roth via The Saturday Evening Post on March 24, 2025
Aerial view of Oakland.

The Future Happens in Oakland First. That’s a Cautionary Tale for Global Cities

International trade boomed with the city’s early adoption of technological and economic changes, but Black neighborhoods became ‘sacrifice zones.’
by Lois Beckett, Alexis C. Madrigal via The Guardian on March 22, 2025
Bethlehem Steel Mill.

The Steel Mill That Built America

Bethlehem Steel was the birthplace of skyscrapers, bridges, and battleships. What happened after the plant's furnaces went cold?
by Matthew Christopher via Atlas Obscura on February 25, 2025
A man in a suit with angel wings clipped to his back, tipping a hat with six different arms.

The Cult of the Entrepreneur

Why do Americans idealize people who found businesses?
by Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein via The New Republic on February 17, 2025
W.E.B. DuBois, seated in garden reading book, while Shirley Graham DuBois waters plants.

How Black Marxists Have Understood Racial Oppression

Black Marxist thought emphasizes the centrality of capitalism to racial oppression and the destructiveness of that oppression for all workers.
by Jeff Goodwin, Jonah Birch via Jacobin on February 17, 2025
A crew of inmate firefighters begins to work on containment during the Hughes Fire in California in 2025.
partner

The Troubling Slavery-Era Origins of Inmate Firefighting

The history of enslaved firefighters offers a cautionary tale about the dangers of relying on involuntary labor to fight blazes.
by Justin Hawkins via Made By History on January 31, 2025
A drawing of a man riding a train and laying down train tracks in front of him.

The Insidious Charms of the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic

You’re passionate. Purpose-driven. Dreaming big, working hard, making it happen. And now they’ve got you where they want you.
by Anna Wiener via The New Yorker on January 27, 2025
Federal employees wait for treatment at a public health dispensary.

Trump Isn’t the First to Upend the Federal Workforce Because of Race

President Woodrow Wilson presided over the segregation of government workers, putting Black people behind screens and in cages in 1913.
by Petula Dvorak via Retropolis on January 23, 2025
Workers with shovels constructing the Panama Canal.
partner

Trump’s Talk of the Panama Canal Taps Into Old Myths About U.S. Power

By threatening to reclaim the Panama Canal, Trump is evoking false stories about U.S. beneficence.
by Julie Greene via Made By History on January 22, 2025
View More
30 of
1005

Filter Results:

Suggested Filters:

Idea

Person

brought to you by
© Bunk History