#pandemic great resignation

[bokchoybussy]

Those 7-figure salarypeople seriously want your slave labor. (No I'm not miscounting.)

Edith Cooper does not give a SHIT about your safety, wellbeing, or sanity at work.

Do not be fooled.

[rando-soapbox]

It’s a generous understatement to state that the COVID-19 pandemic had an impact on every individual. Nearly everyone was challenged to learn how to navigate life in ways contrary to what we’ve always known. Masks and sanitizer became new fixtures in our lives, and something as simple as getting groceries was no longer an option. For those fortunate enough to retain their jobs, they had to learn how to integrate two spheres otherwise kept separate: work and home. And some found that they liked it that way. Millions of people, in fact, chose to leave their jobs in the time following the “end” of the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving a trail of question marks in their wake and a dubious economy wondering all the same question of why?

The Pew Research Center conducted a thorough analysis and compiled a good collection of reasons why employees resigned from their jobs. However, it still begs the question of what actually incited the Great Resignation after such an already impactful moment in history. While there are plenty of articles that delve deeper into the subject of the Great Resignation beyond the one provided, I propose merely two words to condense it all into one palatable explanation: choosing themselves.

Thanks to the pandemic, workers were given a new perspective on work-life balance. Commutes were no longer applicable at the time of the pandemic, so workers were saving money on transportation costs. Another cost-saving item removed from their budget was entertainment because, yet again, they couldn’t leave their homes. Money wasn’t the only currency workers were saving. Time was also a commodity. Employees had free reign over their schedules that they could allot to other aspects of their life (i.e., childcare, traveling, education, etc.). For the first time, employees were now able to put themselves first instead of their job(s).

[quotesfrommyreading]

Molly Phelps, an emergency doctor of 18 years, considered herself a lifer. Her medical career had cost her time with her family, wrecked her circadian rhythms, and taxed her mental health, but it offered so much meaning that “I was willing to stay and be miserable,” she told me. But after the horrific winter surge, Phelps was shocked that her hospital’s administrators “never acknowledged what we went through,” while many of her patients “seemed to forget their humanity.” Medicine’s personal cost seemed greater than ever, but the fulfillment that had previously tempered it was missing. On July 21, during an uneventful evening spent scrolling through news of the Delta surge, Phelps had a sudden epiphany. “Oh my God, I think I’m done,” she realized. “And I think it’s okay to walk away and be happy.”

America’s medical exodus is especially tragic because of how little it might have taken to stop it. Phelps told me that if her workplace “had thrown a little more of a bone, that would have been enough to keep me miserable for 13 more years.” Some health systems are starting to offer retention bonuses, long-overdue raises, or hazard pay. And the next generation of health-care workers doesn’t seem to be deterred. Applications to medical and nursing schools have risen during the pandemic. “That workforce is apparently seeing the best of us, and maybe their vision and energy is what we need to make us whole again,” Esther Choo told me.

But today’s students will take years to graduate, and the onus is on the current establishment to reshape an environment that won’t immediately break them, Choo said. “We need to say, ‘We got this wrong, and despite that, you’re willing to invest your lives in this career? What an incredible gift. We can’t look at that and change nothing.’”

 —   Why Health-Care Workers Are Quitting in Droves

[falcieridesigns]

Stop Comparing Your Sales Figures To 2020

Stop Comparing Your Sales Figures To 2020

If there is one thing you should absolutely NOT be doing right now, it’s comparing your sales figures to 2020 or even 2021. 2020 was a weird, random blip in the system with huge knock on effects into 2021 and beyond. Trying to emulate that in 2022 is going to harm your business, your enthusiasm and ultimately your motivation to keep working on your Etsy shop. Etsy’s stock market figures crashed…

[ladylooch]

Love & Fairness -[Nico Hischier]

A/N: OPE! I LIED!!!! We do have a full fic for Sunday! The Nico and Lexi angst I've been hinting at for months from that original lil blurb. Hope you all enjoy a little roller coaster for our perfect parents.

Word Count: 4.3k

Timeline wise: Nico and Lexi are married. Lucie is between 1-2. Mack and Sophie are not born.

The night is coated with cozy nostalgia in a dimly lit Hoboken restaurant. Lexi sits with her former nursing coworkers, discussing the most ridiculous patient and staff stories from the hospital since the last time they all connected. Lexi is embarrassed to admit that she hasn’t been able to attend one of these meet ups since Lucie was 3 months old. Her daughter is over a year old now. But life has been hectic with her and Nico’s new addition, plus the long stretches of hockey the Devils have been playing. 

It’s all worth the sacrifice to watch Nico hoist the cup above his head. Soon, Lexi thinks. Soon he will reach his dream and then maybe the pressure can ease a bit. 

With two fingers, she twirls the stem of her now empty martini glass as Gretchen whines about the limited available to take time off with how short staffed the hospital is. 

“We need more people. They can’t even find nurses through the program Lexi came here on.”

“Really?” Lexi’s eye raise in surprise. “It was so competitive when I started there.”

“The pandemic has thinned the desire. Plus working conditions are awful.” Lexi nods. The circumstances weren’t great when she left either.

“Honestly, even if we could find part time people it would help alleviate the pressure.” Ashley mutters, throwing her curly red hair back over her shoulder. The table pauses. Then collectively, they all glance Lexi’s way, including Shawna, who had been relatively quiet.

“What? Me?”

“You were just talking about how boring and mundane your life has been. Maybe… coming back part time would help fulfill your sense of purpose.” Ashley shrugs. 

“Lex, things haven’t been the same since you left. We could really use your sunshine right now.” Gretchen adds on. 

“I am raising my daughter. That is my priority.” Lexi hears herself say the same thing her and Nico have talked about since Lexi became pregnant. But inside her body, a bubble of hope and excitement fills her chest. It starts as a tiny, translucent circle and begins to grow the more the two women encourage her to reconsider. 

“Raising Lucie is incredibly important.” Shawn agrees. “This wouldn’t detract from that, especially on a part time basis. Think of your immediate impact! You haven’t been out of the industry that long. All your certifications are still relevant. You could easily slide in a few days a week, for 3-4 hours at a time. They’re even allowing part-timers to build their own schedule from week to week. It would be the perfect fit for you!”

“And they have daycare in the hospital now! You could bring Lucie there. Socialization is so important for babies. You could have it all right there rather than scheduling a million mommy and me play dates.”

Lexi stares at her three friends in front of her, a slight smile on her face. The gears turn in her head, consider, contemplating, feeling excited at the prospect of returning to a profession she spent so many hours of her life working in. But the though of Brady looms over her head. Losing him took Lexi a long time to get through. She still wakes up at night sometimes, hearing the flat line of his monitor.

“I don’t think I could go back to pediatric. Not with Lucie.” Lexi shakes her head, sighing.

“You wouldn’t have to. They are fully staffed.” Gretchen assures. She begins to dig around in her purse. “Look, just call Aly. She would be excited to hear from you. The rest could easily get worked out.” Lexi takes Ally Schneider’s card, her former boss. Ally had been the one who held Lexi after she lost Brady. She was the one who sent Lexi home and she was the one who accepted her resignation a week later, with full grace and understanding. She would be compassionate and supportive of Lexi being a mother. Maybe this could work. 

In a quiet room, in the back of her mind, a part of her pauses at the thought of bringing this up to Nico. He is so proud of Lexi being a stay at home mom and wife. He shouts it to anyone who will listen about Lexi’s important role in their household. She does worthwhile work for them. He puts he on a pedestal because of it.

Lexi decides that she will talk to Ally first, before she approaches it with Nico. After all, her friends have a clear agenda here. Maybe it wouldn’t be as simple and flexible as they are portraying. 

So Lexi decides, before she talks to Nico, she will talk to Ally. 

- - -

Later that week, Lexi steps out of her evening shower, onto the white, memory foam mat. Nico waits outside the glass enclosure, holding up a fluffy towel for her to step into. He wraps it around her back, then lazily stuffs one corner over the other into her breasts. Lexi grips the towel closed, knowing it won’t stay up like that. That may have been her husband’s agenda.

“Thank you.” She sighs, getting on her tip toes to kiss him. He crushes her into his chest, using his tongue to trace along her lip, then dash into her mouth. Lexi melts into his sexy warmth. Nico grips the towel at her hips, pulling her flush with him. 

“You’re welcome. Luc is sleeping.”

“Finally.” Lexi sighs. 

They had a hard night with Lucie. She was fighting sleep from the moment dinner ended, rubbing her eyes, and saying no to bed time, even to daddy. They both took turns rocking her, putting her in her crib, but nothing was giving. Finally, Nico took her to the couch with a warmed up blanket from the dryer. Lexi disappeared upstairs at Nico’s request. Between now and then, their little girl finally succumbed. Nights like this are becoming more prevalent for Lucie. Lexi is not surprised as their little girl is more toddler than baby these days. Both her and Nico need to buckle up for the upcoming roller coaster of their daughter growing up. She smiles at the thought. There is no one else Lexi would rather do this with. 

How will you going back to work effect her? An inner voice whispers like a siren.

Lexi raises her green eyes to the mirror, staring at her expression. She looks worried. And she is. Because she has a job offer expiring tomorrow that she still hasn’t talked to her husband about. She never expected to walk out of her meeting with Ally three days ago with an offer of employment. She had told Ally she needed time to talk to Nico, but then the Devils lost two back to back games and Nico’s mood has been less than desirable for the conversation. 

Beside her, Nico grabs his tooth brush then dots toothpaste on the bristles. Lexi assesses his mood, seeing him relaxed although a bit tired.

“Can we talk about something?” She begins while dabbing a finger into her moisturizer. She presses three generous dots in a triangle, then begins to smooth them into her face.

“Mhm.” He says around the tooth brush oscillating against his back molars.

“I think…” Lexi starts, then swallows loudly as she stop herself. Nico continues to brush his teeth, looking at her in the mirror. She pretends to smooth out more of her moisturizer on her neck. Her heart flutters heavily against her throat. When she doesn’t continue, Nico turns fully to look at her.

“What?” He mumbles around the white foam in his mouth. Her tongue caresses the side of her mouth anxiously.

Why is this so hard to spit out?

Nico spits out his toothpaste, then wipes his mouth.

“I think I want to go back to work.” She finally sputters out. Nothing about her voice sounds confident. Nico whips his head in surprise at her. He opens his mouth and then closes it, pursing his lips. Lexi immediately sense his annoyance.

“Okay? But, we have talked about how important it is for you to stay home with Luc? You’ve always agreed to that.”

“Yeah….” She trails off, sticking her tongue into the pocket of her cheek so it juts out. “But I’ve been thinking about what I want lately, as me, and I really miss working with patients and having a place to go outside of here.” Nico’s eyes widen, and he looks away, sighing. 

“Okay.” He shakes his head. “I thought you were done with nursing after Brady.” Lexi doesn’t flinch at his name, but her heartbeat patters more heavily in her body.

“I thought so too, but it’s been calling to me the last few months. And I have an opportunity to go back.”

“I don’t see how that is going to work for our family.” Nico shrugs simply, already seeming done with the conversation.

“Well, can we talk about it? Because I talked with Ally-” 

“What does you talking with Ally have to do with our family? Because you and I have already discussed this, before we had Lucie. You said you would stay home because I’m gone so much. How…” Nico scoffs, looking above her head, trying to find his words. “So what, someone else is going to come here every day and watch her? Or we drop her off at some day care center where random people are raising her?”

“They have a daycare at the hospital. She could go-”

“No. Our daughter deserves better than that.” Nico shakes his head vigorously.

“So you just unilaterally decide this for me then?”

“So you unilaterally get to decide to go back to work?” He shoots back at her. Lexi stand up completely straight, rolling her shoulders back.

“You don’t own me.” She hisses out unexpectedly. Immediately, she wants to take the words back at the fire igniting in Nico’s eyes. His cheeks begin to turn red in frustration while he forces a hand through his long, brown locks.

“When did I say that?” Nico snaps. His tone and voice are reaching places Lexi has never heard from him. Her eyes narrow at him, then she turns to leave the bathroom. Nico is hot on her heels. “You’re putting me in a position to be the asshole, Lex. You and I agreed you would stay home with our kids.”

“Well I need something more!” She huffs at him. “Emma gets to go be-”

“That’s Emma and Timo. Not us.” She startles, feeling like a scolded child by their parent. Tears begin to fill her eyes at the shame of his disappointed scowl.

“I’m allowed to change my mind.” She whispers to him, hating the way her lip trembles.

“Yeah you are, but not when it ruins our kid’s life.”

“Nico, that is so unfair.” Her tone wobbles at her words. Nico’s jaw tightens at the two drops that escape her lids. He looks away, large eyebrows jumping as he tries to brush the effect of her emotions away.

“I don’t care, Lexi.” Nico shakes his head again. “The answer is no.” 

Lexi shakes her head in disgust before heading into their master closet to change. She cries as she pulls on her pajamas. When she returns with tears on her face, Nico doesn’t even care.

Instead, he climbs into bed and turns his back to her like a cold, distant monster.

- - -

Nico and Lexi don’t talk the whole next day. Not even about Lucie. They move around the house, avoiding each other. She goes to the store to grab groceries; he stays home with Lucie. They sit silently, watching TV during dinner. Lucie doesn’t seem to notice, snacking on her food and playing with her toys like everything is normal. 

This continues into the following morning when Nico has to head out on a five game road trip. He dotes all over their daughter as Lexi’s resentment for him breeds into an ugly, angry tyrant in her mind. She doesn’t even let him kiss her cheek when he is about to leave. She slides away from him, turning her back on him like he did to her two nights ago. His heavy sigh makes tears sting her eyes, like she is the one in the wrong here.

“Lex.”

“Nothing about this will be resolved before you leave in the next two minutes. Travel safe.” She responds without turning towards him.

He stands there for a few more moments, rubbing his hand along Lucie’s head as she munches on her oatmeal. Internally, Lexi wonders if he will try to find some middle ground regardless of her words. But then Nico leaves without apologizing, or saying I love you, or providing any comfort like he usually does. She feels herself hating him a little bit more.

She doesn’t watch the Devils games that week.

She is so angry with Nico. They do nightly FaceTime calls with Lucie, but Lexi don’t speak to her husband. Nico gets more and more frustrated with her. It begins to bleed out onto the ice against the St. Louis Blues. Nico gets two penalties in the game, including five minutes for fighting. Of course, Lexi doesn’t know this because she is watching. She knows because Emma Meier shows up at their door with a bottle of rose the next day.

“What is going on?” She asks when Lexi opens the door. Lio is on her hip, munching on an apple sauce pouch as she strolls in. Emma is in dark wash, tight designer jeans and a tan, long sleeved crop top. Her hair is straightened and perfect, not even a hint of frizz from the rainy humidity earlier in the morning. She puts the bottle of rose on the counter, then goes to put Lio next to Lucie. She’s pulling her skin tight jeans back up her waist as she looks expectantly at Lexi. “Nico wouldn’t share anything with me. Timo couldn’t get it out of him either.”

“Of course not.” Lexi snorts, then rolls her tense neck muscles out. Emma nods her head at Lexi to continue. She sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. “I want to go back to work and the dictator of this house said no.” Emma widens her eyes. 

“Nico said no?” The words seemingly taste awful to her as she says them. 

“Yep. He told me if I go back to work I’m ruining our daughter’s life.”

“No.” Emma’s mouth opens in shock.

“Yes!” Lexi exclaims, reaching for the bottle of wine. She twists the top open, then takes two really big glugs. The acidity burns at her esophagus as she puts the bottle back down. Emma picks it up, taking a more delicate sip. She slowly blinks and shakes her head.

“Wow, I’m surprised.”

“Me too.” Lexi responds, sighing heavily. Tears prick at her eyes as she recounts the conversation from last week. She purses her lips, looking back at Emma.

“I don’t understand why he gets to make this decision for me?”

“He doesn’t.” Emma says simply. “This is your life. You have the right to do the things you want to do with it. Your partner needs to be supportive of that.”

“Nico doesn’t seem to see it that way.” Lexi looks out into the living room, watching as Lucie coos at Lio, holding up a large, red lego block. Lio takes it from her, then puts it next to a blue one.

“Oh we can’t do that one. Rangers colors.” Lio shakes his head. “Grab a green one, LuLu.” 

“I’ll talk to him.” Emma insists after pouring two glasses of rose. “He is being unreasonable.”

“Actually, I’d prefer if you didn’t.” Lexi sighs, tracing a circle onto the marble counter top, then looks up at her. “I think it would just make it worse.” Emma scans her sister-in-law, then nods in understanding.

This is one they’ll have to work through on their own.

- - -

The night Nico is due home, Lexi stares at the ceiling, replaying everything that has happened in the last two weeks. Life went from the mundane, same day over and over again, to this angsty, aching storyline of push and pull between a husband and wife. She went from having no job prospects, to receiving an offer, to turning it down. She hasn’t even told Nico. She doesn’t want to. Doesn’t feel like he deserves to know with the way he has been acting.

Her phone lights up the room as the garage camera catches Nico returning home from his late night flight from Colorado. Tears curve into the water line of Lexi’s eyes. Normally, after a road trip this long, she would gallop down the stairs excitedly to throw herself into his arms. He could catch her. They would make out like teenagers against the refrigerator, then he would carry her upstairs to make love. 

Not tonight.

Her brain traces his path through the house from memory, knowing when he stops at Lucie’s room. Five minutes later, she hears him rustling with his bag outside and closes her eyes, pretending to be asleep so she can avoid an interaction with him. Her lip trembles as she shakily swallows to wet her dry throat.

Nico comes into the bedroom almost completely silent. He drops his things in the closet and presumably changes. Lexi’s chest aches when he comes to the bed and grabs his pillow afterwards. His footsteps are so silent, when his voice speaks from next to her, her heart jumped into her throat. 

“Lex?” She startles at his touch. Nico grimaces. “I’m sorry… When I went in to kiss Luc, she was hot. She has a fever.” Lexi moves to get up. Lucie was fine when she checked her a few hours ago. “No, please. I’d like to take care of her myself.” 

“You can bring her in here.”

“No, you deserve to sleep.” He reaches out tentatively for her cheek, cupping it briefly. “Goodnight. I love you.” It’s the first time he’s said it to her directly in a week. He moves to pull away and she grips his wrist.

“I love you too.” She earnestly looks into his deep, brown eyes. “But I am also so mad at you.”

"I know. You have every right to be.” He maintains direct eye contact when he says it. Lexi’s eyebrows furrow. “We will talk tomorrow.” He leans down tentatively and Lexi goes the other 50% until their lips meet. The kiss is sad and achey. Their lips crave the taste of the other, but can’t go all in like they want to. Lexi pulls away first, stroking her nose along Nico’s. She can feel his lashes against her forehead. Then he pulls away to go lay on the floor of their daughter’s room.

The next morning, Lexi is up first. She pokes her head into the guest room, seeing Nico and Lucie have moved there together. Lucie’s bare feet are pressed into Nico’s chest, cheeks pink, hair wild like it had been sweaty and dried sometime during the night. Lexi creeps in, pressing a hand to her toddler’s forehead. No fever. With that comfort, she tiptoes from the room again. 

Downstairs, she makes herself a berry smoothie and settles into the couch with a book. She stays there for a bit, then begins to feel antsy waiting for her loves to wake up. She heads back upstairs, unpacking Nico’s bag completely and getting started on his laundry. She bring his three suits to the downstairs closet for dry cleaning to pick up tomorrow.

It’s almost lunch time when a sleepy Nico and Lucie come downstairs together. Lucie smiles at her mama around a pacifier in her mouth. Lexi arches a slender eyebrow at Nico. Lucie hasn’t had pacifiers for 6 months.

“I lost the battle.” He groggily mumbles. His long hair is flopping every which way. He hands their daughter over to Lexi, then kisses her head. “ ‘m gonna take a shower.”

Nico disappears back upstairs while Lexi gives Lucie some of her leftover smoothie. She sucks it up happily, babbling for some banana when she is done. Lexi is cutting that up when Nico returns downstairs. His hair is slicked back from his shower. He is dressed in new lounge sweats while texting on his phone.

“Do you want a smoothie?” Lexi asks him.

“No, I’m going to make myself some eggs. Do you want any?”

“No, I already ate.”

“Okay.” He wraps an arm around her waist from behind. Lexi resists the urge to tense, trying to purposefully relax her upper body. Nico rests his chin on one of her shoulders, then turns his nose into her neck.

“I was completely out of line last week.” He murmurs while staying there. Lexi scoops up the banana pieces and puts them in a small bowl for Lucie, then slides it across the counter to where she is in her highchair. Lexi puts the knife down and turns so her and Nico are facing each other. He keeps her enclosed in his arms with a palm resting on the counter, on either side her.

“Do you only love me because I’m the mother of your child?” Lexi ponders.

“No, Lex. I love you. The person. So much.” He finishes with a whisper. His eyes trace her face earnestly. Lexi nods. 

“I turned them down.” She admits.

“I’m sorry.”

“And I’m sorry if I have a hard time believing that.” Lexi says pointedly. 

“Fair.” Nico nods then swallows hard. “But I am.” 

“Can I get an explanation?” Lexi asks. She reaches her hands out to rest on his hips, gripping the waistband of his joggers as an anchor.

“I’m having a hard time with how much I’m missing of Lucie growing up. And I put that fear into you last week. Like… I’ve been able to fall back on the idea that you’re here. And if you go back to work, what will I have to ease my failures as a father?” He touches his chest delicately. Lexi lowers her gaze to his beaded bracelets. She moves one of her hands up to hold his wrist. “If this is what you need to do… to be happy… to feel what I get to feel when I step onto the ice every day, then I am in full support of you.”

She stares at his chest, letting his words sink in. As he always is, Nico is patient. When her eyes meet his again, they stare at each other wordlessly for a moment. She is wary. He can sense it.

“I know I hurt you and I’m so sorry.” He whispers. She nods her head in recognition of his apology.

“Nico, you are an amazing dad. It makes me really sad you feel like you’re failing our daughter. That couldn’t be farther from the truth.” She shakes her head, blowing out a sigh. “And I wish you would have shared that with me before it turned into this.”

“I’m embarrassed.” He shrugs. “I’ve been good at everything my whole life. Working so hard to overcome any obstacles.. but there are things I can’t give to Lucie and it kills me, babe.” The way he says babe wrecks her. Lexi moves his hand to the side so she can slide against his chest. Her fingers clutch at his muscular back and dig into his scalp as she cradles their heads together.

“She is so lucky to have you, Neeks.” Lexi turns to kiss his stubbled cheek. He buries his nose deeper into her collar bone as she stroke along his spine. “I am too.” His large arms wrap around her waist, enclosing it completely.

“Tell me again?”

“Hmm?”

“Tell me you are thinking about going back to work.”

“I’m… thinking about going back to work?”

“Okay. Whatever you want to do is what works for our family. We will figure it out.” Nico murmurs. “That’s what I should have said to you. I’m sorry I didn’t.” Lexi smiles against his cheek. Nico turns, capturing her lips. 

“I accept your apology.” She murmurs. “But I really did already turn Ally down.”

“I’ll call Ally. Tell her your husband was a fucking idiot last week, but he’s done with that.” Lexi chuckles, top teeth dragging over her bottom lip. 

“I would like to try it. See if we can find a balance?” 

“Yes, 100% yes, baby.” 

Across the counter, Lucie squeals excitedly then throws her banana bowl onto the floor. 

“Oh! LuLu is in too!” Nico cheers. “Yay mommy!!!” He claps around her back. Lexi chuckles, a whole body rumbling one as her and Nico separate. Nico grabs Lexi’s phone, sliding it across the counter. “Call Ally.” 

Ally extends another offer to Lexi immediately on the phone. 

Within an hour, Lexi has signed an offer letter and has orientation scheduled for the following Monday. Nico brings her to her first day of work, packs her lunch, and spends the whole time Lexi is working with Lucie in the day care, spending time with the kids, signing autographs for staff members and patients alike. By the end of the Lexi’s four hour shift, he is exhausted.

“No wonder you need a break.” He mumbles, exhaustedly running a hand over his hand. “And she isn’t even tired.” He points out about a babbling Lucie in her carseat. 

“Welcome to my life.” Lexi smirks, then clicks her seatbelt in place. Nico wraps her hand in his, bringing it up to kiss along her knuckles. “So what’s for dinner stay at home dad?” Nico balks at her.

“McDonalds.” He chuckles, turning out of the parking lot.

With ease, the Hischiers settled into this adjusted life, until two pink lines show up a few months later on a test in their master bathroom.

Read more Nico and Lexi here.

[mariacallous]

Moms for Liberty, the extremist “parental rights group,” was supposed to help the Republican Party regain the White House. In July, former president Donald Trump called the anti-LGBTQ group with 300 active chapters across the county a “grassroots juggernaut.” They are credited with forcing schools to lift mask mandates, banning books featuring LGBTQ characters, and supporting anti-trans laws and policies across the country. The group was on track to be instrumental to the GOP in the 2024 election.

But, over the course of the past five months, the group has begun to unravel.

Experts have questioned the claims about the size of the group’s membership, and individual members have been exposed as sex offenders and acolytes of the Proud Boys. Then, last month, Moms for Liberty cofounder Bridget Ziegler admitted in a police interview to being in a relationship with her husband and another woman. The interview was conducted after the woman in question alleged that Ziegler’s husband, Florida GOP chair Christian Ziegler, had raped her.

Ziegler’s husband has denied the allegations and refused to resign from his position as GOP chair, despite calls from Florida governor Ron DeSantis and other state Republicans to do so. Ziegler is also a member of the Sarasota County School Board, and has been instrumental in ushering in Florida’s Don’t Say Gay bill, pushing a Christian agenda in public schools, and banning the teaching of critical race theory. On Tuesday night, the board voted 4–1 in favor of a nonbinding resolution calling for her to resign, marking a rapid fall from grace for Ziegler and a potential fatal blow to Moms for Liberty.

“The impact of the Zeigler scandal has been enormous on the Moms for Liberty structure,” Liz Mikitarian, the founder of the activist group STOP Moms for Liberty, which closely tracks the group’s activities, tells WIRED. “We see chapters moving away or taking a break, chapter leadership questioning their roles and scrambling at the national level to save their ‘mom’ brand. The organization is trying to distance itself from the Zieglers, but this is impossible because the Zieglers are interwoven into the very fabric of Moms for Liberty.”

The group was founded in late 2020 by Ziegler, Tina Descovich, and Tiffany Justice. Ziegler’s close ties to the GOP establishment both locally and nationally helped the group get recognition, propelling their grassroots efforts quickly to the national stage. Initially founded to counter mask mandates during the Covid-19 pandemic, the group’s plans were straightforward: They wanted to support school board candidates who pushed their anti-LGBTQ agenda while advocating for the banning of books that feature people of color or members of the LGBTQ community. The group’s growth was extraordinary. In three years, Moms for Liberty claims to have established 300 chapters in 48 states, with a membership of 130,000 parents. While Ziegler resigned from the group in 2021, she has remained a close ally of the group, speaking at its annual conferences and pushing its agenda from her school board seat.

In a sign of just how coveted an endorsement from the group had become in GOP circles, Trump was joined at their convention this summer by GOP presidential candidates Ron DeSantis, former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, and entrepreneur and great replacement conspiracy proponent Vivek Ramaswamy.

The group’s support from the GOP came despite widespread reports about the harassment and intimidation campaigns that Moms for Liberty members conducted against school board members, teachers, superintendents, and even other parents. These allegations led the Southern Poverty Law Center to label Moms for Liberty an extremist group earlier this year.

But in recent months, controversies and closer scrutiny of the group’s claims have significantly tarnished the group’s image.

Just days after the Moms for Liberty convention in Philadelphia, Heath Brown, a professor of public policy at the City University of New York, wrote on Medium that while Moms for Liberty claims to be a national movement, the vast majority of its membership is concentrated in just four states: South Carolina, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Florida.

“This suggests that the political power is considerable and expanding in some states, but nearly absent and even waning in others,” Brown wrote.

Research from the Brookings Institution published in October confirmed this, and found that while Moms for Liberty was attracting members in Democratic strongholds, it was winning school board elections only in staunchly conservative regions of the country.

While its rapid growth may have suggested that Moms for Liberty would sweep school board races nationwide in November, 70 percent of its endorsed candidates lost their races, according to an analysis from the American Federation of Teachers. Weeks after the embarrassing election losses, the group was forced to remove two Kentucky chapter chairs from leadership positions after the women posed for photos with members of the Proud Boys militia. The group has a long history of associating with members of the Proud Boys, and Ziegler herself had to deny links to the group after she posed with two members at a victory party after she was elected to the Sarasota County School Board.

Then, the group removed Phillip Fisher Jr., a pastor who coordinates faith-based outreach for Philadelphia’s Moms for Liberty chapter, after it was revealed he was a registered sex offender.

Then came the revelations about the Zieglers.

Initially, the Moms for Liberty groups circled the wagons and slammed the media attention on the story, claiming in a statement on X that the sexual assault allegation made against Christian Ziegler was ​​”another attempt to ruin the reputation of a strong woman fighting for America.”

But in early December, a chapter chair in Northumberland County, Pennsylvania, who was also the state legislative lead for the group, announced she and the other members were splitting from the national group to form their own organization because of the leadership’s response to the scandal.

In the weeks since, those who are closely tracking the group’s activities say chapters have gone quiet. Some, including several chapters in Maryland, have been removed from the Moms for Liberty website and their online activity has slowed to a crawl.

“Moms for Liberty has been repeatedly exposed as hypocrites over the past months, but I believe these new issues will be insurmountable to them,” Karen Svoboda, cofounder of Defense of Democracy, a group created to counter Moms for Liberty’s actions, tells WIRED. “Moms for Liberty, the powerhouse that wreaked such havoc on our communities and schools, is becoming undone by their own hubris.”

Despite the vote against her on Tuesday night, Ziegler did not resign, and said the resolution “has no teeth” given that the only person who can remove a school board member is the governor. And given that DeSantis has not asked Ziegler to resign from her position on a Disney oversight board he appointed her to, it’s unlikely he will force her to resign from the Sarasota County School Board.

However, Ziegler has resigned from her position as vice president of School Board Leadership Programs at the Leadership Institute, the highly influential conservative group led by Morton Blackwell, who also cofounded the secretive Council for National Policy. The Leadership Institute has been a major funder of Moms for Liberty since its inception, and Blackwell’s apparent lack of faith in Ziegler could spell trouble for her and Moms for Liberty.

“There are a lot of signs that Blackwell holds the ultimate power over Moms for Liberty,” Maurice Cunningham, a former political science professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston who has tracked Moms for Liberty’s growth closely, tells WIRED. “He will decide Moms for Liberty’s future, and Moms for Liberty cannot continue if he pulls the plug.”

Moms for Liberty did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment about the impact the Ziegler scandal is having on the group or on their membership numbers. Instead, a spokesperson for the group pointed WIRED to a statement issued by Descovich and Justice in the days after the Ziegler scandal broke, distancing the group from Ziegler while also praising her for “remaining an avid warrior for parental rights across the country.”

[actualmermaid]

I'm not going to write another long commentary on "quiet quitting" or "nobody wants to work anymore" or the "great resignation" or whatever. There's been enough of those.

What I AM going to write is a little bit of advice for those of you who are contemplating a career change, because workers have more power than ever and it's a great time to look for a new situation. You can take it or leave it--this is just what worked for me.

Family, school, and culture tried to keep me on a "white-collar professional" track, but I didn't like it and wasn't cut out for it. I have a BA in English and worked a customer service/tech support job for several years until the pandemic hit and we all got laid off (which was, truly, the best thing that ever happened to my professional life). I'm now a pastry chef and I love it.

It's not too late to start something new. Many jobs are willing to train you, as long as you have basic aptitude and willingness to learn. Search for apprenticeships and entry-level positions in fields that interest you, whether or not you have any previous experience.

Keep an open mind. See what jobs are urgently hiring and/or offering good wages, and do some research on what those jobs entail. Does it sound like fun? Send out a resume. You don't have anything to lose by trying or interviewing, even if it doesn't work out.

Write a brief cover letter explaining that you are changing careers, and although you don't have formal experience in [field], you are interested in the work and are willing to learn. Mention the skills that you learned in your previous job(s): customer interaction, critical thinking, time management, bookkeeping, confidence under pressure, whatever.

Don't get discouraged. You're awesome and brave, and if people don't want to hire you, that's their loss. Take your skills and experience to someone who will appreciate them, even if you have to be ghosted and rejected several times in the process.

If you can afford it, don't be afraid to take a little bit of a pay cut. (I got severance from my office job, and my wife makes a good salary, so we could afford to be choosy.) If you have to take a job you don't love in order to pay the bills, keep looking for something better! Again, don't get discouraged!

All experience is good experience. You learned things at your previous jobs, even if it doesn't seem "relevant." If nothing else, previous jobs can tell you what you're NOT cut out for, so you know what to avoid.

You have power in interviews. They're not just deciding whether or not they want to hire you--they're also showing you who they are as a business/industry, and you can (and should!) ask questions and set boundaries. Be firm, confident, interested, and polite.

If you're interested in a specific field, lurk in professional forums online to get a sense of the industry culture and what employers are looking for. Search for things like "electrician forum" or "women in trades" or "forest service lgbt friendly" and so forth.

Get all your paperwork in order. Make sure you have your resume updated and that you have access to transcripts, vital documents, and the names/phone numbers of past employers. Put all of this in one place.

Be bold! Think about what you wanted to be when you were 10, and look up what that job requires! Maybe you won't get to be a paleontologist-astronaut-ballerina, but you'll learn that you have a real talent for making artisanal ballet shoes (or whatever)!

[jessicalprice]

Gus

So to understand Gus’s role in my household, you have to understand my other cats. 

This is Lucy:

She was a tiny little shelter kitty when I adopted her, and it very quickly became apparent (this was in the before times, when I went to an office every day) that she could not be an only cat, because she was deeply sad and anxious being left home alone all day.

So I adopted a kitty she had been fostered with, who’d been kind of the big sister to the other foster kitties. Molly was very maternal, and helped my small orange fluffhead with navigating life.

Molly died from cancer when Lucy was 9. 

Lucy was pretty distraught. She stopped eating and spent her time wandering the apartment, searching and calling for Molly.

So I decided she needed a little brother (I wasn’t going to try to replace her big sister). A big, sweet, silly teddy bear of a little brother who’d keep her busy. Up until that point, I’d assumed all my kitties for the rest of my life would be shelter cats, but in this case I needed a pretty specific temperament, so I went to a Maine Coon breeder who focused primarily on temperament rather than size or coat patterns. 

And that was how I got Max. 

Lucy was very “thanks, I hate it,” at first, but she was annoyed, and annoyed is better than grieving yourself to death. And she comforted him when he would get scared the same way Molly had comforted her, and heaved a lot of big resigned sighs, and let him cuddle with her as long as he bathed first. 

So just as we were going into pandemic lockdown, I moved in with a dear friend, into her tiny rental house with a beautiful fenced in backyard and her two dogs and her cat. 

Lucy pretended to hate it (although she adored my friend), but Max was the happiest he had ever been, and probably the happiest he will ever be. He had a giant dog bro-friend, and my friend’s kitty was the cool older girl he had a little-boy crush on, and her elderly chihuahua was the matriarch of the household whose approval he desperately wanted but whose food he felt compelled to steal. He had a safe little Eden to explore with his friends. And he had two moms!

It was a pretty great year and a half for both of us, but I think I can safely say that it was absolute bliss for Max. 

And then I bought a house and we moved out. 

And Max spent several weeks in my closet, with his face to the wall, all day. He’d come down at night and eat, but he was obviously, manifestly depressed and grieving the loss of all his friends.

And then my housemates moved in, with their 18-month old boy kitty, and Max came out of his closet and was pretty happy again. They weren’t intending to stay long, though.

I knew Lucy and I weren’t enough for him. His ideal world is probably a commune with like at least 5 or 6 other people and 20 dogs and a whole bunch of cats (he LOVED fostering kittens when we were living with my friend) and probably some chickens and goats and maybe a pony. He has a lot of love in him and it’s more than Lucy, who’s a senior kitty, and I can satisfy.

When he’s lonely, he starts bothering Lucy a lot to play with him or cuddle him when she wants to sleep.

So I adopted Gus, Max’s cousin, who was about 18 months younger than Max. 

The thing I didn’t know when I arranged to adopt him was that during the pandemic, the breeder sold a lot fewer cats than usual, so she ended up with a house full of Maine Coons. She admitted to me that she didn’t have time to pay as much attention to the older kittens because she was focusing on the younger ones.

Gus’s siblings had all been adopted, so he was the only one left from his litter.

And it became apparent that he had been DESPERATE to be adopted, or at least to have SOMEONE pay attention to him.

Picture the little boy at the orphanage carefully making sure he is perfectly dressed every day and talking to himself in the mirror all gosh darnit, you are smart and you are handsome and you are HIGHLY ADOPTABLE and today is going to be the day. 

He had the most profound Polite Little Chap energy you’ve ever seen.

He was perfectly behaved for the entire five-hour drive back from the breeder’s, and then I put him in the guest room and gave him an hour to get used to the room and decompress, then went in there. 

Video here.

He was not sure if this was for real, or forever, but he was determined to make a good impression and not put a foot wrong and prove he was HIGHLY ADOPTABLE gosh darnit. 

Is this string for me? Do you want to play? Let me show you how good I am at playing! I can play very dramatically but will never, ever claw you! May I touch you? May I rest my head on your knee? Is this okay? May I headbutt you? 

He was so desperate to prove he was a Good Boy and I kept trying to communicate to him that he didn’t have to prove anything, I had already adopted him. 

If I looked at him, like at all, he would start treading the floor and purring.

I had planned to give him 3-5 days of adjustment time in the guest room, and in the house when Lucy and Max were locked up, before introducing him to Max, but Max was being all MAX WILL LITERALLY DIE IF HE DOESN’T GET TO MEET THE BABY and Gus was purring and headbutting the door, so I let them meet on Day 2. 

There were maybe 20 seconds of hissing and then they were best friends.

Growing up with like 30 other Maine Coons had given Gus pretty exquisite cat social skills, so he won cranky, suspicious Lucy over with shocking quickness.

He decided his goal in life was to be everyone and everything’s support animal, including machines like the dishwasher. Sometimes it makes a squeaking noise when it changes cycles and he always goes running over and puts a paw on it and makes encouraging chirps, like you’ve got this, friend, you can do it!

Anyway, the moral of this story is that every other cat I have acquired has, in some way, been for the benefit of Lucy and I hope she appreciates that. 

[sopebubbles]

Hi darling, I read what you posted about your health and the future of Lone Wolf. I'm not here to tell you to write another chapter or anything, I actually want to share something with you that helped me a lot during a time when I was feeling bad physically in a general way.

Based on personal experience, I highly recommend you to stop eating gluten. Whether your health is being tarnished by it or not, it can hugely impact your lifestyle by leaving it out of your diet. It could also help the medications you are taking to make an even bigger effect on your body.

I don't want to brag about me, but I deem it important to share my experience with you and hopefully it can help you start improving your health.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, I started to notice a regression on my period. I also began feeling nauseous and with high migraines that would make me lay in bed unwillingly. I had to take homeopathy to force my uterus to help me menstruate but once I finished the bottle of medicine, my period would be gone too. The headaches and nausea didn't disappear, at all.

It wasn't until August of this year that my mum, (may she be blessed) told me to stop eating anything with high amounts of gluten, like bread, cake and pasta. Darling, I guarantee you that that Saturday was the first day in three years since I felt "normal" again.

I haven't eaten gluten since then and I have felt way better than months ago.

Sorry for rambling but it pains me to hear you that you are suffering, specially with your health.

This is my case, I am not assuming yours is the same as mine but I highly recommend you to try.

I have found multiple products that are gluten free and are not that expensive as I thought they were.

I discovered my gluten intolerance after three years of feeling like absolute shit. I only hope this can help you, I usually don't share this with anyone as I don't like reminiscing those months when I tired, sleepy, nothing was appetizing to me, my hormones were all over the place. I wasn't living, I was merely surviving.

Take care, and I really wish you would give it a try. You have a beautiful soul and an incredible mind full of amazing stories and plots that need to be known You have a lot to experience and many things yet to see. You have a gift with words and I can tell you have a really big heart.

I wish you the best and I apologise if this was tedious to read. I only wanted to give you a piece of advice and remember we, as ARMY support each other. We are not just a fandom, we are family of the purple blood.

May you have a blessed day and your health may be restored as soon as possible :)

~Rosie 💜

Hi Rosie! Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. I'm sure you are probably right about the gluten thing, but it's one of those things i simply cant resign myself to. I have a hard enough time with food, the idea of cutting out wheat products when I dont like the taste of alternatives just makes me want to cry. Doesnt seem like a life worth living if theres no bread in it.

Sorry it took me so long to reply to this. Im low key really bad at taking unsolicited advice. Im an aquarius sun, Sagittarius moon, so i just cant stand it. But i know you meant well and i appreciate your care. Hope you have a great day 💜

[qqueenofhades]

You are my reliable UK news source so what’s your opinion on the new UK PM? Do you think he’ll do a decent job, or just be another fuck up?

(I’ve watched exactly one news article about him and it was about 2 minutes long so my knowledge of this guy is that he’s rich as fuck and the new PM)

Sunak can take comfort that he's just had the actual-fax worst predecessor of all time, so unless he literally slips on a banana peel, sets off a Rube Goldberg machine that decapitates Charles in some hilarious fashion, runs naked around the city with a banner ordering everyone to crash the pound now, and ruins the next season of the Great British Bake-Off, he could hardly do worse. He is also the first British Asian/BAME Prime Minister and a practicing Hindu, so that's noteworthy. The hardcore Brexiteer racists hate him for being brown. The hardcore Johnson loyalists hate him for dramatically resigning as chancellor this summer and bringing BoZo the Clown down, down, down. (They, of course, don't give a shit about BoZo's many, MANY lies. He should have stayed in office anyway!!!!)

However, nobody should go getting too excited. While Sunak is regarded as more economically pragmatic and less diehard Thatcherite than Truss, he's still a Tory, and therefore beholden to some ridiculous and arbitrary goal of Reducing Government Spending and increasing austerity, rather than sorting out the incredible damage that twelve years of Tory economics have done to the country. He did dish out billions in support packages as chancellor during the worst of the pandemic, which was good of him, I suppose, but is now insistent that they have to Balance The Books and get it back!!! He's probably also going to bring Suella Braverman back as Home Secretary, which is especially disappointing; they're both British-Indian and yet they're trying to pull up the ladder behind them and continue to do horrible things to migrants and the UK's totally fucked asylum and immigration system. At least the odious Jacob Rees-Mogg is out of cabinet? That is... something. I guess. God, I hate that guy.

Overall, Sunak can at least pretend to be a grownup politician rather than a robotic Margaret Thatcher wind-up toy, and the markets responded somewhat favorably to his appointment. But he's not received a single vote ANYWHERE, from ANYONE -- not from the Tory MPs, not from Parliament as a whole, not from the Tory grassroots party members, and certainly not from the whole country. If the Conservatives actually thought they would win a general election, they would call one, but they'll do their best to put it all the way off to 2025 and hope that everyone has somehow forgotten about the total clown show happening ever since Brexit. If Sunak returns to disastrous economic and energy policies, with not a shred of a popular mandate, then that's going to be especially egregious. Sunak is taking over because Truss was historically, epically bad, so yes, standing upright at the microphone and putting together whole sentences would be regarded as a win. But he's an unelected prime minister of a party that has fucked up the country beyond recognition, he still generally subscribes to their policies, and there's no particular reason to think that he's going to do anything aside from govern as a Big Business Friendly, ultra-rich Tory mouthpiece, so yeah.

[ddlcaskblog]

*cracks knuckles*

All right, Monika. I didn't want to have to do this, but you've given me no choice. Since you're so eager to know what our reality is like, it's time to show you...THE TRUTH.

*shows her footage and reports of the Hindenburg*

*shows her footage and reports of Pearl Harbor*

*shows her footage and reports of D-Day*

*shows her footage and reports of FDR's death*

*shows her footage and reports of V-E Day*

*shows her footage and reports of Hiroshima*

*shows her footage and reports of the end of WWII*

*shows her footage and reports of Harry Truman's upset 1948 presidential win*

*shows her footage and reports of Douglas MacArthur's firing*

*shows her footage and reports of Sputnik's launch*

*shows her footage and reports of John Glenn's orbit of Earth*

*shows her footage and reports of Marilyn Monroe's death*

*shows her footage and reports of the Cuban Missile Crisis*

*shows her footage and reports of JFK's assassination*

*shows her footage and reports of Lee Harvey Oswald's assassination*

*shows her footage and reports of Lyndon Johnson dropping out of the 1968 presidential race*

*shows her footage and reports of MLK's assassination*

*shows her footage and reports of RFK's assassination*

*shows her footage and reports of the Apollo 11 moon landing*

*shows her footage and reports of the Apollo 13 crisis*

*shows her footage and reports of the Kent State Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of the Munich Olympics crisis*

*shows her footage and reports of Richard Nixon's resignation*

*shows her footage and reports of the fall of Saigon*

*shows her footage and reports of Elvis Presley's death*

*shows her footage and reports of the Iran Hostage crisis*

*shows her footage and reports of John Lennon's assassination*

*shows her footage and reports of Ronald Reagan being shot*

*shows her footage and reports of the Challenger explosion*

*shows her footage and reports of the fall of the Berlin Wall*

*shows her footage and reports of the beginning of the First Gulf War*

*shows her footage and reports of the Rodney King Riots*

*shows her footage and reports of the Waco standoff*

*shows her footage and reports of the O.J. Simpson saga*

*shows her footage and reports of the Oklahoma City bombing*

*shows her footage and reports of the Flight 800 explosion*

*shows her footage and reports of the Atlanta Olympics bombing*

*shows her footage and reports of Princess Diana's death*

*shows her footage and reports of Bill Clinton's impeachment*

*shows her footage and reports of the Columbine Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of JFK Jr's death*

*shows her footage and reports of the 2000 presidential election controversy*

*shows her footage and reports of 9/11*

*shows her footage and reports of the beginning of the Iraq War*

*shows her footage and reports of Hurricane Katrina*

*shows her footage and reports of the Virginia Tech Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of the 2008 Great Recession crash*

*shows her footage and reports of Barack Obama's 2008 election*

*shows her footage and reports of Michael Jackson's death*

*shows her footage and reports of Osama Bin Laden's killing*

*shows her footage and reports of the Sandy Hook Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of the Boston Marathon bombing*

*shows her footage and reports of the Pulse Nightclub Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of Donald Trump's upset 2016 presidential win*

*shows her footage and reports of the Vegas Country Festival Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of the Parkland Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of Donald Trump's first impeachment*

*shows her footage and reports of Kobe Bryant's death*

*shows her footage and reports of the COVID Pandemic*

*shows her footage and reports of George Floyd's killing*

*shows her footage and reports of Jan. 6th*

*shows her footage and reports of Donald Trump's second impeachment*

*shows her footage and reports of the fall of Kabul*

*shows her footage and reports of the Uvalde Massacre*

*shows her footage and reports of the Maui wildfires*

.

.

.

Keep in mind, Monika, that this is a VERY small sample size of what our world--indeed, my native nation in the United States--has had to deal with over time. This is just some of the stuff we humans in this universe have been able to capture on live film or tape, and we've been around for MILLIONS of years.

If you STILL feel brave enough to want to traverse this world, well...there's not much I or anyone else could probably do to stop you. But you deserve to know the truth--what it was you were ACTUALLY driven to kill the other club members for.

If you need some time alone to reflect and gather yourself, I understand. If you need someone to talk to, I get that too, and I'm here if you need me.

Take care and be good to yourself--and the other club members. <3

M: "..."

M: "Just...Don't show the girls."

[berniesrevolution]

CATALYST JOURNAL

While the uptick in strike activity in 2021 is heartening, its influence should not be exaggerated. The number and extent of job actions was noticeable but still very small by historical standards, and union density continued to decline. A significant labor upsurge might be in the works, but it is not in evidence yet.

In the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, Pope Francis spoke movingly of the workers keeping the world turning in dark times:

People who do not appear in newspaper and magazine headlines or on the latest television show, yet in these very days are surely shaping the decisive events of our history. Doctors, nurses, storekeepers and supermarket workers, cleaning personnel, caregivers, transport workers, men and women working to provide essential services and public safety, volunteers, priests, men and women religious, and so very many others. They understood that no one is saved alone.1

These workers have done everything we’ve asked of them and more. They have been through hell, particularly those who have risked their health and well-being to care for the sick, educate the young, feed the hungry, and deliver the things the rest of us need to get through this period of grinding uncertainty. Employers, politicians, and talking heads have lauded them as essential workers, but the stark gap between the praise and the grim realities of working life in the United States — which was already miserable for millions before the pandemic — have pushed many to the breaking point. Indeed, record numbers of American workers have quit their jobs in what the media has dubbed the Great Resignation. According to the US Labor Department, 4.5 million workers voluntarily left their jobs in November 2021. The number of monthly quits has exceeded three million since August 2020, and the trend shows no sign of slowing down.2 Job switchers span the employment ladder, but turnover has been largely concentrated in the low-wage service sector, where workers are taking advantage of the very tight labor market to get a better deal for themselves. According to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, workers with high school diplomas are currently enjoying a faster rate of wage growth than workers with bachelor’s degrees, a remarkable situation that has not occurred in decades.3

Worker discontent is not only finding expression in the form of quitting and job switching. In 2021, we witnessed a modest increase in the frequency and visibility of collective action in the workplace. Tens of thousands of workers, union and nonunion alike, challenged employers through protests and strikes across sectors and in many different geographical regions. Workers in health care and social assistance, education, and transportation and warehousing led the way, but they were joined by workers in hotels and food services, manufacturing, and other industries. Protests and strikes tended to be concentrated in states where labor is relatively stronger, namely California, New York, and Illinois, but some states with low union density, like North Carolina, saw an uptick in labor action, too. Pay increases were easily the most common demand, but health and safety, staffing, and COVID-19 protocols were high on the agenda as well.

The year 2021 was less a strike wave than a strike ripple, and it has not yet resulted in any appreciable increase in unionization. A few trends stand out. The first is that labor protest and strike action were heavily concentrated among unionized groups of workers. Unionized groups of workers accounted for nearly 95% of all estimated participants in labor protests and more than 98% of all estimated participants in strikes. The second is that protests and strikes were concentrated by industry — namely health care and education, which together accounted for roughly 60% of all labor actions. Finally, protests and strikes were heavily concentrated geographically. Just three states with relatively high levels of union density — California, New York, and Illinois — accounted for more than half the total estimated participants in protests and strikes. In short, collective workplace action is by and large taking place where organized labor still retains residual sources of strength. In this context, spreading protest and strike action beyond its current industrial and regional confines depends on unionization in new places.

Conditions conducive to labor action — rising inflation, pandemic-related pressures, and a tight labor market — are likely to persist into 2022, and the Biden administration’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has been meaningfully supportive of worker organizing. US labor is probably not on the verge of a historic breakthrough, but in this context, workers may have an opportunity to make modest material and organizational gains.

Making new organizational gains is critical to the fortunes of the labor movement and the reviving US left. The vast majority of the workers involved in strikes and labor protests last year were already members of unions, not unorganized workers looking to unionize. This is why it is so concerning that last year’s uptick in labor action occurred amid a further decline in union density in 2021. The overall rate of union membership stands at 10.3% of the total labor force, while the total number of union members, just over fourteen million in 2021, continues its long decline.4 While some have argued that treating union density as the key measure of labor’s strength is a mistake, it seems clear that, at least in the US context, where union density and union coverage almost entirely overlap, it does provide an effective measurement of working-class power.5

Boosting the level of union density should therefore be among the leading priorities of progressives and socialists in the United States. As the power resources school of welfare state scholars has long argued, the relative strength of the labor movement and its affiliated political parties has been the single most important factor shaping welfare state development over time and across countries. Here in the United States, where we have never had a nationwide social democratic party aligned with a strong labor movement, the weakness of working-class organization is clearly reflected in the fragmentation and stinginess of our welfare state. The state-level wave of attacks on organized labor that began in 2010 have made it that much harder for unions to defend working-class interests and reduce inequality. But the fact that they were able to meaningfully mitigate the growth of inequality, even during the period of neoliberal retrenchment, shows that rebuilding the labor movement needs to be a chief priority of any progressive political agenda.6 The Biden administration’s pro-union stance suggests it understands this. But if it’s unable to act decisively to boost union membership, all the pro-union rhetoric it can muster will ultimately amount to little.

TRACKING LABOR ACTION

Researchers at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations (ILR) began documenting strikes and labor protests in late 2020. Their ILR Labor Action Tracker provides a database of workplace conflict across the United States, based on information collected from government sources, news reports, organizational press releases, and social media. It counts both strikes and labor protests as “events” but distinguishes between the two. The major distinction between strikes and labor protests, according to this methodology, is whether the workers involved in the event stopped work. If they did, the event is defined as a strike; if they did not, it is defined as a labor protest. The Labor Action Tracker also collects data on a number of additional variables, including employer, labor organization (if applicable), local labor organization (if applicable), industry, approximate number of participants, worker demands, and more.7

ACTION TYPES

In 2021, there were 786 events with 257,086 estimated participants.8 Over 60% of the events were labor protests, while less than 40% were strikes (there was one recorded lockout). Roughly one-third of the estimated number of workers participated in labor protests, while roughly two-thirds participated in strikes. Further, the average number of estimated workers per labor protest (188) was significantly smaller than the average number of estimated workers per strike (553, see Table 1 for details).

DURATION

Neither labor protests nor strikes tended to last very long, which tracks with the generally sharp decline in strike duration in recent decades.9 Labor protests in particular were very short affairs. Of the labor protests with a start and end date, 96% lasted for just one day or less. Strikes also tended to have a short duration, but they typically did not end as quickly as protests. Of the strikes with a start and end date, one-third lasted for one day or less. Roughly two-thirds of strikes (68%) ended within a week, and over 90% ended within thirty days. One strike stands out for its unusually long duration: a 701-day strike by United Auto Workers (UAW) members against a metallurgical company in Pennsylvania, which began in September 2019 and ended in August 2021.

INDUSTRIES

An informed observer will not be surprised by which industries saw the largest number of labor action events (Table 2). The leading two industries by far were health care and social assistance and education, which are both highly unionized and have been subjected to enormous pressures during the pandemic. Together, they accounted for nearly 40% of the total labor protests and strikes. These industries also comprised over 60% of the overall number of estimated labor action participants — health care with 41.5% of the estimated participants, education with 18.8%. The overrepresentation of health care and education workers becomes even starker when we compare this to their employment shares in the overall labor force. In 2020, these two industries accounted for 16.3% of total nonfarm employment — health care with a 13.8% share and education with 2.3%.10 Put another way, the share of health care workers in 2021 labor actions was roughly three times larger than their share in the nonfarm labor force, while the share of education workers was more than eight times as large.

These two pace-setting industries were followed by a second tier of industries including transportation and warehousing, accommodation and food services, and manufacturing. It is not surprising to see these listed among the most turbulent industries, as they contain a mix of highly unionized employers and nonunion employers that have become a major focus of labor organizing activity, namely Amazon — the most frequently targeted employer, with twelve total labor actions — which was the target of twice as many labor actions as McDonald’s, the second-most targeted employer.

The industrial distribution of labor protests generally follows the overall distribution of labor action, with the notable exception of manufacturing, which saw far more strikes than protests. While the health care industry did not experience the largest number of strikes, it accounts for more than half of estimated strike participants (53%). Workers in education (12.4%) and manufacturing (16%) also accounted for outsize shares of the estimated number of participants.

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[omegawhiskers]

RAW 30/10/23

A Build To Crown Jewel.

This was the last Raw before Crown Jewel, and it was a decent episode. The Judgement Day’s, Rhea Ripley, Dominik Mysterio and JD McDonagh open the show as Rhea recaps a few things before Sami Zayn hits the ring and vows he will put a stop to the stable. Of course the numbers are against Zayn and he gets backup from Ricochet. The funny because Sami doesn’t stick around to even the odds as Ricochet has his match with Dom. The matches itself was good. Dom picked up the win thanks to a distraction. Dirty Dom used the ropes to his advantage for the pin, but the announcers never picked up on it.

The Alpha Academy had a pretty great match with The Creed Brothers. This is my first time seeing this tag team and I was impressed with the fast and technical style. The Creed Brothers got the upset victory with the Brutus Ball.

I’m generally not interested in The Miz. I haven’t seen him evolve over the past few years, and his character never gripped me. But the segment with Gunther showed a vulnerable side to The Miz that I believe is needed. Next week, Miz will have a number one contender’s match with Bronson Reed, Ricochet and Ivar. I think Miz needs to lose or lose against Gunther, causing Miz to go down a down spiral where he has to overcome his doubts. To me, that's a story I can get behind.

Sometimes angles don’t work, and this seems to be the case here as Candice LeRae lost to Xia Li via KO. LeRae received a kick to the head. The angle was awkward because I wasn’t sure if this was a work or shoot. It turns out it was a work, but I wasn’t that into it. Li would show back up to tease a match with Becky Lynch.

Things picked up with a video package from Drew McIntyre. This package really emphasized Drew’s story, his motivation and what the World Heavyweight Championship means to him. I would like to see a heel Drew as champion. The Scottish Warrior has yet to resign with WWE, so we don’t even know if McIntyre will be around this time next year. Seth Rollins gave a good reason why he doesn’t sympathise with Drew. Seth said we all suffered due to the pandemic, some more than others. The conviction between both men is there. Rollins would follow put with a decent TV match against JD.

As far as costumes go, I think Chelsea Green and Piper Niven win with their Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart costumes. The Trick or Street Fight was what it was. I’m just not a fan of this level of silliness, but the costumes were worth it.

The main event also wasn't worth much. Sami and Priest didn't go on for long, and before you know it everybody was getting involved. This led to a DQ. The highlight was Cody Rhodes delivering a cross rhodes on JD onto the announce table.

I liked the stories that were told, but the matches as whole were just average as a total.

[mercurygray]

Here is a modern parable about growth.

In the early days of the pandemic, I posted a message on Facebook about how (since I live alone and have no pets) it would be good to have something to care for, like a plant. Thankfully, my workplace has no shortage of gardeners and good people, and one of my coworkers potted up a spiderplant for me and brought it over (along with, of all things, some sewing supplies and Fireball whiskey.)

My goal, for most of 2020, was to not kill the plant. And I succeeded! In 2022, however, the plant was in dire need of re-potting, which I did to great success, allowing it to send out shoots, which I then shared with friends. After its wild leggy growth spurt, however, it was starting to look really sad again. I re-potted it again in April of this year, and it has continued to look very sad on my kitchen window ledge since.

I had resigned myself to the idea that I had finally killed my plant.

Yesterday, for reasons I can't explain, I decided the plant needed more water than usual. This, of course, caused the pot to overflow onto my much abused window ledge, prompting me to move the plant to my dish drainer.

Going back to do the dishes later that day, I noticed something.

That, friends, is new growth - which I hadn't seen before, because I was too busy looking at the front of the plant and how sad it looked.

Growth is possible. Change is possible. You just might not be looking at the right part of your plant to see it. (And sometimes it takes a small disaster and being moved to the dish drainer to get the message.)

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

As we learned in the recent rail union contract negotiations, ruthless profit-seeking has made conditions for railworkers unbearable. It’s also made railroads less efficient. America badly needs a national rail service owned and operated for the public good.

Earlier this year, the federal board charged with overseeing America’s rail network called a hearing to discuss widespread complaints about higher costs and poor service. Predictably enough, rail executives sought to blame the pandemic and labor shortages for the likes of gridlock and supply-chain breakdowns. But the dysfunction on America’s railroads is neither a product of COVID-19 nor the result of nebulous constructs like the so-called “Great Resignation.” As Matthew Buck explained earlier this year in an article for the American Prospect, the single biggest contributors have been corporate monopolism and financialization — both of which contributed to the horrendous working conditions at the center of the recent showdown in Congress.

Thanks in large part to Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan–era deregulation, American rail has steadily become more consolidated — the number of major carriers shrinking from forty to just seven between 1980 and the present day. Unsurprisingly, there’s little evidence that this shift has made rail transport any more efficient. It has, however, made the rail business incredibly lucrative. In an effort to wring as much profit from railways as possible, company barons have in turn cut costs, laid off workers, and introduced a host of other changes ostensibly geared to improving the quality of service. Central to this project has been something called “precision scheduled railroading” (PSR), the brainchild of late executive Hunter Harrison. Under PSR, as Buck explains:

"Railroad management’s job is to drive down the 'operating ratio,' or operating expenses as a percentage of revenue. In other words, Wall Street judges railroads’ success based in part on spending less money running the railroad and more on stock buybacks or dividends. Theoretically, focusing on lowering operating ratios pushes railroads to be more efficient, to do more with less. But when railroads have the market power they have today, they can instead 'do less with less,' as shippers and workers put it."

The upshot, in addition to appalling conditions for an ever-diminishing workforce, is that railways — a basic utility relied upon by millions every day for commerce and transport — are now treated more than ever as an asset designed to be milked for profit than a service structured to meet need.

For shareholders, the whole arrangement has worked out brilliantly. As companies like Union Pacific have laid off tens of thousands of workers, revenues have gone through the roof and billions have been paid out through dividends. Measured against more relevant metrics, of course, it’s been a catastrophe: even before the pandemic, both overall productivity and the number of usable track miles were down. When COVID-19 brought with it backlogs, derailments, and higher costs, however, it became glaringly clear that cutbacks to the railways driven by their hyperfinancialization have rendered them a significant weak point in the country’s supply chain.

One lesson in all this is that an enterprise can be profitable — and thus “efficient” in a narrow business sense — without actually working particularly well or operating effectively to service the needs around which it’s ostensibly erected. This is true in most industries, but it has always been particularly applicable in the case of rail. As the late historian Tony Judt once explained, the very idea of competitive or market-based railroads is, for very straightforward reasons, fundamentally incoherent:

"You cannot run trains competitively. Railways — like agriculture or the mail — are at one and the same time an economic activity and an essential public good. Moreover, you cannot render a rail system more efficient by placing two trains on the same track and waiting to see which performs better: railways are a natural monopoly. . . . Trains, like buses, are above all a social service."

Judt was primarily writing about Britain’s railways, but the essence of his argument applies to America’s as well. Actual “competition” is a non sequitur when it comes to railroads and, fittingly enough, private monopolism has left a handful of rail giants with what are essentially noncompetitive fiefdoms in different corners of the country. Deregulation has additionally allowed the tiny remaining handful of companies to discontinue service on unprofitable routes, leaving whole regions cut off. With greater control and fewer constraints on the terms of their operations, they’ve also been at liberty to raise prices and introduce new fees. Bottlenecks, in fact, often provide further opportunities for such price-gouging — one executive boasting on a 2019 earnings call that Union Pacific is in a position to “take some pretty robust pricing to the market” (i.e., charge more regardless of efficiency or the quality of service).

A further corollary, of course, is that those who actually make the trains run and keep the tracks in working order have been increasingly expected to do more with less and endure a brutal work culture no reasonable person could possibly defend: having gone three years without a raise, many railworkers are now required to be on call more or less around the clock and expected to report for shifts of up to eighty hours on as little as ninety minutes’ notice. Unable to take time off even in the event of an emergency, many also face punitive attendance policies that can see them suspended or terminated if they can’t show up for work.

Freshly reimposed by a Democratically controlled Congress without substantive modification, these horrendous conditions are a potent symbol of what happens when an essential public good like rail is turned over to Wall Street. Smashing the monopolies, introducing stricter regulation, and giving workers paid time off would certainly be a good start. For the sake of its supply chain, transport needs, and basic economic fairness, however, what America ultimately needs is a single national railway, owned and operated in the public good.