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American Made: What Happens to People When Work Disappears
What happens when Americans lose their jobs? In this illuminating story of ruin and reinvention, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Farah Stockman gives an up-close look at the profound role work plays in our sense of identity and belonging, as she follows three workers whose lives unravel when the factory they have dedicated so much to closes down.
Shannon, Wally, and John built their lives around their place of work. Shannon, a white single mother, became the first woman to run the dangerous furnaces at the Rexnord manufacturing plant in Indianapolis, Indiana, and was proud of producing one of the world’s top brands of steel bearings. Wally, a black man known for his initiative and kindness, was promoted to chairman of efficiency, one of the most coveted posts on the factory floor, and dreamed of starting his own barbecue business one day. John, a white machine operator, came from a multigenerational union family and clashed with a work environment that was increasingly hostile to organized labor. The Rexnord factory had served as one of the economic engines for the surrounding community. When it closed, hundreds of people lost their jobs. What had life been like for Shannon, Wally, and John, before the plant shut down? And what became of them after the jobs moved to Mexico and Texas?
American Made is the story of a community struggling to reinvent itself. It is also a story about race, class, and American values, and how jobs serve as a bedrock of people’s lives and drive powerful social justice movements. This revealing book shines a light on this political moment, when joblessness and uncertainty about the future of work have made themselves heard at a national level. Most of all, it is a story about people: who we consider to be one of us and how the dignity of work lies at the heart of who we are.
Shannon, Wally, and John built their lives around their place of work. Shannon, a white single mother, became the first woman to run the dangerous furnaces at the Rexnord manufacturing plant in Indianapolis, Indiana, and was proud of producing one of the world’s top brands of steel bearings. Wally, a black man known for his initiative and kindness, was promoted to chairman of efficiency, one of the most coveted posts on the factory floor, and dreamed of starting his own barbecue business one day. John, a white machine operator, came from a multigenerational union family and clashed with a work environment that was increasingly hostile to organized labor. The Rexnord factory had served as one of the economic engines for the surrounding community. When it closed, hundreds of people lost their jobs. What had life been like for Shannon, Wally, and John, before the plant shut down? And what became of them after the jobs moved to Mexico and Texas?
American Made is the story of a community struggling to reinvent itself. It is also a story about race, class, and American values, and how jobs serve as a bedrock of people’s lives and drive powerful social justice movements. This revealing book shines a light on this political moment, when joblessness and uncertainty about the future of work have made themselves heard at a national level. Most of all, it is a story about people: who we consider to be one of us and how the dignity of work lies at the heart of who we are.
432 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 12, 2021
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July 21, 2021
“American Made What Happens to People When Work Disappears” is, at its best, a story about factories closing in the Midwest and work disappearing to Mexico and China. It is the story about what happens to the proud people who work the heavy machines and are forced to train their foreign replacements as the factories in their hometown close and work disappears like water circling and then washing down the drain. Indianapolis, where the story takes place, was a center of manufacturing where people with a high school education could get a high-paying job and take care of their families. But, in a story all too familiar, those factories keep closing and the jobs keep going away.
The story centers around three workers in a ball bearing plant, Rexnord, where Shannon, Wally, and John find themselves, each one of the three having faced struggles through life such as having children as teenagers, jail time, broken marriages, and domestic abuse. None of the three are priveleged and none have ever had it easy. Shannon, for instance, got a factory job in a male-dominated environment as a means of escaping a violent domestic abusive relationship. Wally and John similarly fought their way to be accepted at the factory and in the union (for John).
The author is obviously talented and her craft is evident throughout these three interlaced stories that all end with the factory closing and no equivalent work available. However, unlike Mike Rowe, the author here does not simply let these three stories speak for themselves and that is where the narrative falters. The author, a Harvard-educated New York Times reporter, left the Upper Westside of Manhattan to journey to Indiana and find out why blue-collar Americans voted for Donald Trump in 2016. It is evident from the start that the author looks down on these uneducated people as hillbillies and can’t fathom why unionized workers who have seen their jobs moved offshore for cheaper labor or find themselves now competing with illegal immigrants who are willing to undercut union wages to survive would vote for someone who seemed to understand their plight. Thus, at times, the book was more about the author’s political leanings than about the three people who were supposed to be at the center of the story.
The other point where the book falters is that the author constantly refers to the three people by their races even when it is not necessary to the narrative. John is constantly referred to as a White man and Wally as a Black man rather than simply as individuals. Ultimately, the author argues in the final chapters that, no matter what these people struggles are dealing with poverty, job losses, domestic abuse, or raising a special needs child, those struggles are unimportant in comparison to their skin color and the lessons on critical race theory that the final chapters convey.
What could have been a top-notch book about how tough life is when the factory closes and the jobs go away becomes nothing more than a New York Times editorial page that focuses on other issues, not on the difficulties that come with the loss of high-paying skilled factory jobs.
The story centers around three workers in a ball bearing plant, Rexnord, where Shannon, Wally, and John find themselves, each one of the three having faced struggles through life such as having children as teenagers, jail time, broken marriages, and domestic abuse. None of the three are priveleged and none have ever had it easy. Shannon, for instance, got a factory job in a male-dominated environment as a means of escaping a violent domestic abusive relationship. Wally and John similarly fought their way to be accepted at the factory and in the union (for John).
The author is obviously talented and her craft is evident throughout these three interlaced stories that all end with the factory closing and no equivalent work available. However, unlike Mike Rowe, the author here does not simply let these three stories speak for themselves and that is where the narrative falters. The author, a Harvard-educated New York Times reporter, left the Upper Westside of Manhattan to journey to Indiana and find out why blue-collar Americans voted for Donald Trump in 2016. It is evident from the start that the author looks down on these uneducated people as hillbillies and can’t fathom why unionized workers who have seen their jobs moved offshore for cheaper labor or find themselves now competing with illegal immigrants who are willing to undercut union wages to survive would vote for someone who seemed to understand their plight. Thus, at times, the book was more about the author’s political leanings than about the three people who were supposed to be at the center of the story.
The other point where the book falters is that the author constantly refers to the three people by their races even when it is not necessary to the narrative. John is constantly referred to as a White man and Wally as a Black man rather than simply as individuals. Ultimately, the author argues in the final chapters that, no matter what these people struggles are dealing with poverty, job losses, domestic abuse, or raising a special needs child, those struggles are unimportant in comparison to their skin color and the lessons on critical race theory that the final chapters convey.
What could have been a top-notch book about how tough life is when the factory closes and the jobs go away becomes nothing more than a New York Times editorial page that focuses on other issues, not on the difficulties that come with the loss of high-paying skilled factory jobs.
May 10, 2022
This book’s premise is not necessarily new: well-educated liberal from northeast goes to rust belt to try and understand why people there live and vote the way they do. However, there’s more to this book than meets the eye, and I think Stockman did an excellent job telling these three characters’ stories.
First, I should say that I loved the format. It reminded me of “the warmth of other suns” in that, rather than just stating historical facts, it focused on the stories of three very different, complex characters who were laid off from the factory. I also appreciated the tone. Despite any preexisting biases she may have had, the book felt like a genuine exploration. To me, it was less “let’s see why these folks could be fooled into voting for Trump”, and more “let’s try and understand, based on their unique backgrounds and experiences, why these folks see the world in the way that they do”. Clearly Stockman spent a lot of time building trust with the characters, and I didn’t sense condescension when she talked to or about them.
Another key point from the book is that if you’re only viewing politics through the lens of a ‘left’<—>’right’ spectrum, you’re missing a lot. Instead, many in places like these view politicians along the spectrum of ‘fights for everyday Americans’<—>’fights for the wealthy elite’. This is why Sanders and Trump were both popular in the area, despite their apparent differences.
I think Stockman raises a fair point around globalization: even if it makes the country better as a whole, we need to have an honest conversation around who it really benefits. With the US getting cheaper TVs and cars, it’s easy for lawyers and software engineers to extol the virtues of globalization, but they haven’t had to face diminishing job prospects in the same way that blue-collar Americans have. The easy response is to dismiss all of these claims as backwards and protectionist, but that is neither empathetic nor a wise political calculation in the long-run. Even if wealthy elites only have their own interests in mind, I’m not sure how much longer this broken system can continue before enough people bring out the pitchforks.
One last thing this book pointed out to me is that many people get intrinsic value from working, not just because of the paycheck. Even some financially-stable factory employees who got laid off started slipping into depression afterwards. This was not because they couldn’t pay the bills, but more because they felt like their life was meaningless and lacked purpose. This is important to keep in mind when discussing different policy options to address these issues.
If you like this format of books and are curious to learn about the past, present, and future of America’s working class, I definitely recommend reading this.
First, I should say that I loved the format. It reminded me of “the warmth of other suns” in that, rather than just stating historical facts, it focused on the stories of three very different, complex characters who were laid off from the factory. I also appreciated the tone. Despite any preexisting biases she may have had, the book felt like a genuine exploration. To me, it was less “let’s see why these folks could be fooled into voting for Trump”, and more “let’s try and understand, based on their unique backgrounds and experiences, why these folks see the world in the way that they do”. Clearly Stockman spent a lot of time building trust with the characters, and I didn’t sense condescension when she talked to or about them.
Another key point from the book is that if you’re only viewing politics through the lens of a ‘left’<—>’right’ spectrum, you’re missing a lot. Instead, many in places like these view politicians along the spectrum of ‘fights for everyday Americans’<—>’fights for the wealthy elite’. This is why Sanders and Trump were both popular in the area, despite their apparent differences.
I think Stockman raises a fair point around globalization: even if it makes the country better as a whole, we need to have an honest conversation around who it really benefits. With the US getting cheaper TVs and cars, it’s easy for lawyers and software engineers to extol the virtues of globalization, but they haven’t had to face diminishing job prospects in the same way that blue-collar Americans have. The easy response is to dismiss all of these claims as backwards and protectionist, but that is neither empathetic nor a wise political calculation in the long-run. Even if wealthy elites only have their own interests in mind, I’m not sure how much longer this broken system can continue before enough people bring out the pitchforks.
One last thing this book pointed out to me is that many people get intrinsic value from working, not just because of the paycheck. Even some financially-stable factory employees who got laid off started slipping into depression afterwards. This was not because they couldn’t pay the bills, but more because they felt like their life was meaningless and lacked purpose. This is important to keep in mind when discussing different policy options to address these issues.
If you like this format of books and are curious to learn about the past, present, and future of America’s working class, I definitely recommend reading this.
September 15, 2021
Well, I have to hand it to Farah Stockman: she really succeeded. It's like she got up one day and said, “Hey, I think I will attempt to explain my nation to itself by devoting years of my life to writing a non-fiction book as a labor of love. I'll try to cross the American class divide and challenge all my preconceptions. I'll take time off my perfectly comfortable and prestigious job in the big city, leave my family and friends, spend hours in airports commuting half-way across the country to interview my subjects and research their histories, and spend more hours attending their parties, dinners, family funerals, days at work, court appearances, and so on. I'll read fat, serious, and angry books about the apparently insoluble problems afflicting my country. I'll try to integrate the reading and journalism into a seamless whole. While doing so, I'll criticize myself and expose the hypocrisy and comfortable self-deceptions that members of my own class have told themselves to ease their consciences. And then, when I'm done and the book is published, people with no other qualification than high self-regard will accuse me (without providing evidence) of looking down on and condescending to the subjects of my book, apparently because, as a Manhattan-residing, Harvard-educated mixed-race child of academics (oh, and also, a woman), I cannot possibly possess the imagination and empathy to understand the sufferings of others. As a bonus, they'll also accuse me of being an anti-white racist and a supporter of bogus historical theories! That'll be fun!”
Life is hard these days. Although a great deal of rigorous research and observant reporting went into this book, it may be difficult to read about the unwarranted and unremedied misery visited on good people by apparently unstoppable forces of history and economics. If you can, then do it, because the people being left behind by the changes in the world are worth remembering, and even helping.
I got an advance electronic review copy of this book for review from Penguin Random House via Netgalley. Thanks for the generosity.
Life is hard these days. Although a great deal of rigorous research and observant reporting went into this book, it may be difficult to read about the unwarranted and unremedied misery visited on good people by apparently unstoppable forces of history and economics. If you can, then do it, because the people being left behind by the changes in the world are worth remembering, and even helping.
I got an advance electronic review copy of this book for review from Penguin Random House via Netgalley. Thanks for the generosity.
August 31, 2021
Strong Case Studies Marred By Author's Biases. Overall, this is a strong case study following three people the author somewhat randomly stumbled into when tasked with reporting on the closure of a particular factory and its implications on the 2016 and 2020 elections. The author openly admits in the very first chapter that she is a fairly typical New England Liberal Elite, and that flavors much of her commentary and several of her observations - but also provides for at least a few hints of potential growth along the way. But once her own biases are accounted for, this truly is a strong look at a deep dive into the three people she chronicles and their histories and thoughts as they navigate both their personal situations over these few years and the national situations as they see and understand them. At times funny but far more often tragic, this is a very real look at what at least some go through when their factory job closes around them, to be moved elsewhere. (Full disclosure, my own father living through this *twice* in my teens in as Goodyear shut down their plants in Cartersville, GA has defined my own story almost as much as a few other situations not relevant to this book. So I have my own thoughts on the matter as someone whose family underwent similar situations a couple of decades before the events of this book, but who saw them as the child of the adult worker rather than as the adult workers chronicled here.)
Ultimately, your mileage on this will vary based on whether you can at minimum accept the author's biases for what they are or even if you outright fully agree with them. But I *do* appreciate the flashes of growth she shows, particularly in later sections, as she learns just how fully human these people are, even as her prejudices early in the book somewhat openly show that she didn't fully appreciate just how fully human people like this could be before actually spending considerable time with them. Indeed, the one outright flaw here is that there is at least a hint of impropriety when the author begins engaging perhaps a bit too much with the lives of her subjects - but again, that ultimately comes down to just how sensitive your own ethical meter is.
Overall a mostly strong book, and very much recommended.
Ultimately, your mileage on this will vary based on whether you can at minimum accept the author's biases for what they are or even if you outright fully agree with them. But I *do* appreciate the flashes of growth she shows, particularly in later sections, as she learns just how fully human these people are, even as her prejudices early in the book somewhat openly show that she didn't fully appreciate just how fully human people like this could be before actually spending considerable time with them. Indeed, the one outright flaw here is that there is at least a hint of impropriety when the author begins engaging perhaps a bit too much with the lives of her subjects - but again, that ultimately comes down to just how sensitive your own ethical meter is.
Overall a mostly strong book, and very much recommended.
April 5, 2022
Super mixed feelings about this book. I don't know if I even have the energy to go into the whole "rich liberal making money off of interviewing poor people about how their lives have gone off the rails because they lost their jobs." Part of it feels a little slimy to me, even when she tried to compare her own privilege to the people she was writing about, it came across to me more as bragging than trying to recognize her own bias.
What I did find interesting was the content of the book. I don't know a lot about that part of the country or manufacturing in general. I also thought the political conversations she had with the workers, especially about white privilege, were super interesting.
What I did find interesting was the content of the book. I don't know a lot about that part of the country or manufacturing in general. I also thought the political conversations she had with the workers, especially about white privilege, were super interesting.
January 17, 2022
The ending of her book undermined its value for me.
She profiles three people, and because the one black man she profiles dies, she erases poverty as the primary axis of their oppression (even though the book is about the desperation created by job loss) again choosing to divide the poor by race so that they don't come together as a class and undermine the economic privilege of people like herself.
Since "black" americans are disproportionately poor, her "woke" editorializing disproportionately harms black people.
All poor people are suffering more than people of the professional class (like Ms. Stockman) regardless of their race.
As long as we insist on pretending that poor "black" people have more in common with economically privileged "black" people than they do with poor "white" people, the economic status quo will never change (which is to the benefit of those who are privileged by it - like Ms.. Stockman).
As a homeless rights advocate, and survivor of homelessness, I can introduce Ms. Stockman to plenty of "white" people who are not surviving, who will not survive, and who basically sleep in the pee of their homeless "black" compatriots.
This book was written for economically privileged people who are more comfortable dealing with race than with class, because they do not want the economic status quo to change.
Wanna help poor and working class "black" people?
Give your gentrified neighborhood back to the poor and working class people that your greed has forced out.
She profiles three people, and because the one black man she profiles dies, she erases poverty as the primary axis of their oppression (even though the book is about the desperation created by job loss) again choosing to divide the poor by race so that they don't come together as a class and undermine the economic privilege of people like herself.
Since "black" americans are disproportionately poor, her "woke" editorializing disproportionately harms black people.
All poor people are suffering more than people of the professional class (like Ms. Stockman) regardless of their race.
As long as we insist on pretending that poor "black" people have more in common with economically privileged "black" people than they do with poor "white" people, the economic status quo will never change (which is to the benefit of those who are privileged by it - like Ms.. Stockman).
As a homeless rights advocate, and survivor of homelessness, I can introduce Ms. Stockman to plenty of "white" people who are not surviving, who will not survive, and who basically sleep in the pee of their homeless "black" compatriots.
This book was written for economically privileged people who are more comfortable dealing with race than with class, because they do not want the economic status quo to change.
Wanna help poor and working class "black" people?
Give your gentrified neighborhood back to the poor and working class people that your greed has forced out.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 22, 2022
As the son of white working-class parents and a teacher to Black and Trans and Immigrant and Wealthy and Poor students and as a voter who couldn't comprehend the rise and continued support of Trump, I don't know that there's a book that does a better job of explaining the positions of everyone who lived through the 2015-2021 American Experience.
Why did the jobs leave, why does it matter, and why can't we just blame one side? It's all here.
Why did the jobs leave, why does it matter, and why can't we just blame one side? It's all here.
October 3, 2021
5 stars
American Made
What Happens to People When Work Disappears
By Farah Stockman
I had to sit and ponder on this book for a day or so just to process the realities of what I just finished reading. I am still not sure I can do American Made justice. Farah Stockman has written an inspiring, infuriating, and educational look at the mess left behind when a plant closes; as well as the limited options blue-collar workers have in the wake of losing their jobs.
Wally, Shannon and John desperately search for jobs that will pay as well as Rexnord while struggling to keep their families afloat. Stockman follows this trio for three years and has utterly managed to capture their personalities, their lives, and their struggles.
American Made needs to be required reading in every economics class taught across the country as this is a book that has the ability to make a reader question their viewpoint on the realities of free trade and the world economy.
I highly recommend this book!
I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher and Netgalley.
American Made
What Happens to People When Work Disappears
By Farah Stockman
I had to sit and ponder on this book for a day or so just to process the realities of what I just finished reading. I am still not sure I can do American Made justice. Farah Stockman has written an inspiring, infuriating, and educational look at the mess left behind when a plant closes; as well as the limited options blue-collar workers have in the wake of losing their jobs.
Wally, Shannon and John desperately search for jobs that will pay as well as Rexnord while struggling to keep their families afloat. Stockman follows this trio for three years and has utterly managed to capture their personalities, their lives, and their struggles.
American Made needs to be required reading in every economics class taught across the country as this is a book that has the ability to make a reader question their viewpoint on the realities of free trade and the world economy.
I highly recommend this book!
I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher and Netgalley.
October 26, 2021
Expertly written, balanced, insightful look at a plant closing in the industrial midwest in the timeline of NAFTA, China trade deals and that goon who stole the White House. Stockman spins a lot of delicate plates on skinny sticks and keeps the storytelling aloft. I grew up in Detroit, had plenty of family who made a living working the line, working in tool and die shops, and whose children then worked for automotive/industrial wearing skirts and suits. Boomers were predicted to be the last generation who could get a job, move quickly from one job to the other without a college degree. It didn't last for a completed career. Free trade took that ease of employment away, right at the time 50+ year olds were this close to being able to retire. Stockman shows us the people at Rexnord who packed up their machines, their tools, and wheeled their toolboxes off the floor unwillingly. I still have my Dad's toolbox. He raised 7 children with the tools he made inside that toolbox.
April 17, 2022
I don't think this adds much to the "explain Trump to liberals" genre. Stockman herself seems to have a very limited, and privileged, position. Everything she finds novel I think is well known to anyone who's followed the news even slightly. There is nothing revelatory about the characters she follows. Ignorant and willfully misinformed, they are about as repulsive and ugly as the least-informed liberal might have expected from watching ten minutes of Fox propaganda.
September 11, 2021
AMERICAN MADE (2021)
By Farah Stockman
Random House, 432 pages.
★★★★
The subtitle of "American Made," Farah Stockman’s look at blue-collar work, is "What Happens to People When Work Disappears." Labor historians speak of “deindustrialization” to describe exporting factory work out of the United States. Alas, it’s an antiquated label given that far more than factory labor is outsourced.
Capital flight is a more accurate term. It has long been linked to negative social indicators: drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, divorce, suicide, medical woes, early death, homelessness, psychiatric problems, imprisonment…. In today’s service industry-driven economy, displaced workers seldom replace income lost to capital flight. Not many non-white-collar jobs pay $26/hour, the starting wage at Rexnord in Indianapolis, a shaft bearings manufacturer. Do the math. At $26/hour, a Rexnord worker made $54,000 per year—without overtime. If laid-off workers are lucky enough to find another job paying half of that, their annual income is $27,000—25 percent below the nation’s median individual income.
Few who have studied worker displacement will be surprised by the data in Stockman’s book. Stockman instead puts human faces to capital flight. Many workers are given voice in "American Made," but she spotlights three: Wally Hall, an African American who dreams of operating his own barbecue business; Shannon Mulcahy, a white single mother and skilled machinist; and John Feltner, a white family man and union activist. By focusing on a factory in Indianapolis, Stockman highlights how the American Dream was battered in the American heartland. Blue-collar work has declined in such places to the point that those who punch time clocks have become out-of-sight/out-of-mind forgotten Americans. In 1972, sociologists Richard Sennett and Jonathan Cobb published The Hidden Injuries of Class. It was meant as a warning, but is now an unintended harbinger of what continues to happen to those falling behind in income and social clout.
Because professional classes no longer “see” the working class, they are baffled by the 2016 election and the propensity of working-class voters to support politicians whose policies are antithetical to their best interests. Stockman provides uncomfortable explanations for the rise of Donald Trump: free trade and elitism. She traces how the Democratic Party shifted from the ideals of New Deal and Great Society to modified Reaganomics coupled with support for the social concerns and stock portfolios of educated bourgeois elites. In this sense, blue-collar anger toward the Clintons makes sense. Stockman writes, “The Democrats had gotten into bed with corporations when no one was looking.” Tim, a Rexnord worker, put it more graphically: “The dirty bastards sold us out. They allowed millions of jobs to leave the country … good jobs with benefits. They sat on their asses and did absolutely nothing.” Many of those whose jobs fled to Mexico—like Rexnord workers—turned their backs to a party tone deaf to job loss.
Stockman observes, “The Republicans were no better about free trade. They were worse. But at least the Republicans had never pretended to be faithful to the working class.” Parse that and you get a vast segment of American workers that indeed feels sold out. Trump at least acknowledged that blue-collar labor exists, though his vow to stop outsourcing was unfulfilled. (For the record, 58 percent of American workers are non-salaried.) Thus, many Rexnord workers liked the fact that Trump, “didn’t talk like a college boy. He cursed. He bragged. He threatened…. Trump was a hillbilly in a suit. Trump had a chip on his shoulder, like the steelworkers did.” Such perspectives also explain why many wage earners express contradictory admiration for both Trump and Bernie Sanders.
A unique twist in "American Made" lies with Stockman’s admission of her class privilege. This grabs our attention because Stockman identifies as African American. She has much to say about white privilege, but also incisively compares herself to Shannon. Stockman grew up in bourgeois comfort, graduated from Harvard, lives in tony Cambridge, Massachusetts, and has worked at the Boston Globe and the New York Times. Shannon overcame sexual abuse, an abusive husband, raised kids on her own, suffered workplace discrimination, and was ordered to train a Mexican to perform complex tasks on a machine that was about to be disassembled and shipped out of ther country. Is it any wonder Shannon hasn’t been an avid supporter of NAFTA, middle-class feminism, #MeToo, or Hillary Clinton? The kicker is that Shannon is not racist. She did not lash out at the Mexican man about to take her job. Shannon blames Wall Street for her dilemma, not Mexicans hoping to build a better life.
"American Made" is filled with such insights. Another eye-opening observation is that people of color often cope better with job loss than whites. To put it starkly, they have fewer reasons to believe in the American Dream and aren’t shocked when its promise is betrayed. By contrast, Feltner was staggered when union solidarity disintegrated among workers given a choice between refusing to cooperate with plant relocation or collecting a few more paychecks from a company hell-bent on squeezing greater profits from lower-paid brown workers south of the border.
Stockman is a lucid writer who knows how to personalize capital flight and make stories live. A review such as mine is by necessity formal and academic in tone. Stockman also culls labor history and sociological studies, but because she got close to her subjects, she writes from the heart. Read her words to see what happens to Rexnord workers, especially Wally, Shannon, and John. Warning: no fairy tales. Stockman references Sherry Lee Linkon, who compared economic “right-sizing,” restructuring,” and other such euphemisms to what really happens when a plant closes. It’s akin to a nuclear detonation that leaves misery and destruction in its wake.
Robert E. Weir, Ph.D.
By Farah Stockman
Random House, 432 pages.
★★★★
The subtitle of "American Made," Farah Stockman’s look at blue-collar work, is "What Happens to People When Work Disappears." Labor historians speak of “deindustrialization” to describe exporting factory work out of the United States. Alas, it’s an antiquated label given that far more than factory labor is outsourced.
Capital flight is a more accurate term. It has long been linked to negative social indicators: drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, divorce, suicide, medical woes, early death, homelessness, psychiatric problems, imprisonment…. In today’s service industry-driven economy, displaced workers seldom replace income lost to capital flight. Not many non-white-collar jobs pay $26/hour, the starting wage at Rexnord in Indianapolis, a shaft bearings manufacturer. Do the math. At $26/hour, a Rexnord worker made $54,000 per year—without overtime. If laid-off workers are lucky enough to find another job paying half of that, their annual income is $27,000—25 percent below the nation’s median individual income.
Few who have studied worker displacement will be surprised by the data in Stockman’s book. Stockman instead puts human faces to capital flight. Many workers are given voice in "American Made," but she spotlights three: Wally Hall, an African American who dreams of operating his own barbecue business; Shannon Mulcahy, a white single mother and skilled machinist; and John Feltner, a white family man and union activist. By focusing on a factory in Indianapolis, Stockman highlights how the American Dream was battered in the American heartland. Blue-collar work has declined in such places to the point that those who punch time clocks have become out-of-sight/out-of-mind forgotten Americans. In 1972, sociologists Richard Sennett and Jonathan Cobb published The Hidden Injuries of Class. It was meant as a warning, but is now an unintended harbinger of what continues to happen to those falling behind in income and social clout.
Because professional classes no longer “see” the working class, they are baffled by the 2016 election and the propensity of working-class voters to support politicians whose policies are antithetical to their best interests. Stockman provides uncomfortable explanations for the rise of Donald Trump: free trade and elitism. She traces how the Democratic Party shifted from the ideals of New Deal and Great Society to modified Reaganomics coupled with support for the social concerns and stock portfolios of educated bourgeois elites. In this sense, blue-collar anger toward the Clintons makes sense. Stockman writes, “The Democrats had gotten into bed with corporations when no one was looking.” Tim, a Rexnord worker, put it more graphically: “The dirty bastards sold us out. They allowed millions of jobs to leave the country … good jobs with benefits. They sat on their asses and did absolutely nothing.” Many of those whose jobs fled to Mexico—like Rexnord workers—turned their backs to a party tone deaf to job loss.
Stockman observes, “The Republicans were no better about free trade. They were worse. But at least the Republicans had never pretended to be faithful to the working class.” Parse that and you get a vast segment of American workers that indeed feels sold out. Trump at least acknowledged that blue-collar labor exists, though his vow to stop outsourcing was unfulfilled. (For the record, 58 percent of American workers are non-salaried.) Thus, many Rexnord workers liked the fact that Trump, “didn’t talk like a college boy. He cursed. He bragged. He threatened…. Trump was a hillbilly in a suit. Trump had a chip on his shoulder, like the steelworkers did.” Such perspectives also explain why many wage earners express contradictory admiration for both Trump and Bernie Sanders.
A unique twist in "American Made" lies with Stockman’s admission of her class privilege. This grabs our attention because Stockman identifies as African American. She has much to say about white privilege, but also incisively compares herself to Shannon. Stockman grew up in bourgeois comfort, graduated from Harvard, lives in tony Cambridge, Massachusetts, and has worked at the Boston Globe and the New York Times. Shannon overcame sexual abuse, an abusive husband, raised kids on her own, suffered workplace discrimination, and was ordered to train a Mexican to perform complex tasks on a machine that was about to be disassembled and shipped out of ther country. Is it any wonder Shannon hasn’t been an avid supporter of NAFTA, middle-class feminism, #MeToo, or Hillary Clinton? The kicker is that Shannon is not racist. She did not lash out at the Mexican man about to take her job. Shannon blames Wall Street for her dilemma, not Mexicans hoping to build a better life.
"American Made" is filled with such insights. Another eye-opening observation is that people of color often cope better with job loss than whites. To put it starkly, they have fewer reasons to believe in the American Dream and aren’t shocked when its promise is betrayed. By contrast, Feltner was staggered when union solidarity disintegrated among workers given a choice between refusing to cooperate with plant relocation or collecting a few more paychecks from a company hell-bent on squeezing greater profits from lower-paid brown workers south of the border.
Stockman is a lucid writer who knows how to personalize capital flight and make stories live. A review such as mine is by necessity formal and academic in tone. Stockman also culls labor history and sociological studies, but because she got close to her subjects, she writes from the heart. Read her words to see what happens to Rexnord workers, especially Wally, Shannon, and John. Warning: no fairy tales. Stockman references Sherry Lee Linkon, who compared economic “right-sizing,” restructuring,” and other such euphemisms to what really happens when a plant closes. It’s akin to a nuclear detonation that leaves misery and destruction in its wake.
Robert E. Weir, Ph.D.
November 8, 2021
Thank you, NetGalley, for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review,
I was very surprised at how much I liked this book, Stockman's attempt to understand the people behind the closing of the Rexnord/former LinkBelt factory outside Indy, one of the two (the other was Carrier) that drew president-elect Trump's ire. This was also a really solid, in -depth look at the current & diminishing role of the union, something I found interesting against the current IATSE negotiations, although white collar v. blue collar is in play there as well.
After speaking with a number of people, Stockman focused on three: Raleigh (Wally) Hall, Shannon Mulcahy and John Feltner. These were not one-dimensional Trump voters who truly believed he'd directly prevent their jobs from moving to Mexico, but rather folks disillusioned by the failures of the past and willing to give him a try. Through Feltner, Stockman really explored what white privilege looks like to someone who has lost a home in bankruptcy, has ancestors who were coal miners and doesn't feel as if he's ever had an advantage. With Hall, she explored the impact of a felony conviction, as well as the lack of access to healthcare, which unfortunately lead to his premature death before the end of the book. And with Mulcahy, the layers of privilige even within poor white working class. As Stockman said, as different as these three were, they had way more in common with one another than she did with them, coming from Cambridge and becoming a mother at the time they were nearly all grandchildren and caretakers to more than just the nuclear family.
A really layered look at working class middle America and how Trump was able to get more than a toehold. Good references to other books throughout, while reading as if a work of fiction.
I was very surprised at how much I liked this book, Stockman's attempt to understand the people behind the closing of the Rexnord/former LinkBelt factory outside Indy, one of the two (the other was Carrier) that drew president-elect Trump's ire. This was also a really solid, in -depth look at the current & diminishing role of the union, something I found interesting against the current IATSE negotiations, although white collar v. blue collar is in play there as well.
After speaking with a number of people, Stockman focused on three: Raleigh (Wally) Hall, Shannon Mulcahy and John Feltner. These were not one-dimensional Trump voters who truly believed he'd directly prevent their jobs from moving to Mexico, but rather folks disillusioned by the failures of the past and willing to give him a try. Through Feltner, Stockman really explored what white privilege looks like to someone who has lost a home in bankruptcy, has ancestors who were coal miners and doesn't feel as if he's ever had an advantage. With Hall, she explored the impact of a felony conviction, as well as the lack of access to healthcare, which unfortunately lead to his premature death before the end of the book. And with Mulcahy, the layers of privilige even within poor white working class. As Stockman said, as different as these three were, they had way more in common with one another than she did with them, coming from Cambridge and becoming a mother at the time they were nearly all grandchildren and caretakers to more than just the nuclear family.
A really layered look at working class middle America and how Trump was able to get more than a toehold. Good references to other books throughout, while reading as if a work of fiction.
November 18, 2021
This is such an outstanding book that I really encourage everyone to read. It is riveting to follow the lives of three factory workers who really enjoy and work hard at their jobs, making good wages with excellent benefits and what happens to them when that factory moves to Mexico.
The misguided and little understood ramifications of NAFTA and other trade deals that were supposed to help the average American worker who doesn't have a college education, instead tore their lives to shreds...and still they persevere.
This book also delves into the change in expectations for CEOs. Employees were once considered stockholders in a company too, not because they actually owned company stock, but because they were considered so vital and were so invested in their jobs. A CEO'S responsibility included balancing these stockholders with those actually owning stock. Now, as we know, decisions are made only with these stockholders on mind, to the detriment of our country and its people.
I could go on, but two takeaways for me are 1) only 1/3 of Americans have a college education and yet the approach to work and jobs in this country is geared towards that 33% rather than the 66% without; and, 2) it is that tone-deafness that caused so many of that 66% to vote in desperation for a life-time con man. Desperate people do some desperate things.
There's more, but again, such a worthwhile book!
The misguided and little understood ramifications of NAFTA and other trade deals that were supposed to help the average American worker who doesn't have a college education, instead tore their lives to shreds...and still they persevere.
This book also delves into the change in expectations for CEOs. Employees were once considered stockholders in a company too, not because they actually owned company stock, but because they were considered so vital and were so invested in their jobs. A CEO'S responsibility included balancing these stockholders with those actually owning stock. Now, as we know, decisions are made only with these stockholders on mind, to the detriment of our country and its people.
I could go on, but two takeaways for me are 1) only 1/3 of Americans have a college education and yet the approach to work and jobs in this country is geared towards that 33% rather than the 66% without; and, 2) it is that tone-deafness that caused so many of that 66% to vote in desperation for a life-time con man. Desperate people do some desperate things.
There's more, but again, such a worthwhile book!
August 14, 2022
I have to admit that I'm a bit of a sucker for these personal stories that act as a synecdoche for the larger stories of off shoring and globalization. You get a real sense for the hopelessness of people trying to achieve the American Dream of a generation or two ago when you could have a middle class life with a high school education, a factory job, and a union card.
Somehow the American Dream has died without anyone realizing how terminally ill it was. It has left behind a vacuum that has often been filled with Trumpism, but in reality it is a vacuum that can't be filled easily and Trumpism is a desperate attempt to fill it. The factories are gone and they aren't coming back, but that doesn't mean we should be ok with abandoning these people.
This speaks to a larger loss that has snuck up on us all which is that the American Dream of our parents and grandparents is largely not available to generations X and below. The thought of retiring with insurance and savings is beyond comprehension for most of Americans.
This book does a nice job of capturing that loss by following three different workers from the same plant in Indiana.
I was grateful that the author pointed to some potential causes for the larger shift and that she mentioned Stakeholder Value vs. Shareholder Value as a philosophical difference in the way businesses are run starting in the '70s and '80s as a possible cause. Very few people seem to consider this.
Somehow the American Dream has died without anyone realizing how terminally ill it was. It has left behind a vacuum that has often been filled with Trumpism, but in reality it is a vacuum that can't be filled easily and Trumpism is a desperate attempt to fill it. The factories are gone and they aren't coming back, but that doesn't mean we should be ok with abandoning these people.
This speaks to a larger loss that has snuck up on us all which is that the American Dream of our parents and grandparents is largely not available to generations X and below. The thought of retiring with insurance and savings is beyond comprehension for most of Americans.
This book does a nice job of capturing that loss by following three different workers from the same plant in Indiana.
I was grateful that the author pointed to some potential causes for the larger shift and that she mentioned Stakeholder Value vs. Shareholder Value as a philosophical difference in the way businesses are run starting in the '70s and '80s as a possible cause. Very few people seem to consider this.
June 30, 2023
A New York Times editorialist sets out to find out what happens to blue-collar workers when the factory they work at shuts down. Author Farah Stockman spent years researching this book, by following three employees of the Rexnord Link-Belt factory in Indianapolis, Indiana. This is something of a sociological study. She observes and reports on the lives of a white woman, a black man, and a white man, and their hopes and dreams, and their families. She spent an awful long time setting up all of the details of the workers prior to the plant shutting down, and then when the plant finally did shut down, the book was nearly over. So there really wasn't a lot to report on after the factory closed. I guess the book could better be described as in the anticipation of the factory closing. There was the last chapter which was about the hot mess which was 2020, and Covid, and the presidential election, and it was refreshing to see that certain individuals' had learned that Trump was not the be-all, end-all. Anyway. I liked this book and am giving it four stars.
February 6, 2022
The author does a good job telling the stories of three people who experience the loss of a job following the closure of their steel plant. The NY Times did plenty of stories during the Trump years about why people in the Midwest voted for Trump, and generally they felt too anecdotal and also too often seemed to ignore the real issue: racism. This book goes deeper than those articles. It confronts the racism, but also addresses the issues of our society as a whole. Closure of manufacturing plants may well have been good for the global economy, but it wasn't for parts of Ohio. All of the stories in the book are heartbreaking at times. They are frustrating. As with other books written since COVID started, you see how existing societal issues have only become much worse much more quickly, and it is maddening.
March 31, 2022
If you read the book "Evicted" which happens to be one of my favourite non-fiction reads, American Made follows a similar journalist plot. I've always been aware of the issues facing people as manufacturing is getting outsourced everyday - moving to cheaper labour force countries. I have read about and seen the effects it had on blue collar workers. However, this book had me question and re-think my analysis on a lot of these issues. I learned a lot about NAFTA and it's effects on people, how it actually may have bigger implications to the workforce than we have been told. It was also fascinating to see how Stockman brings together the concept of class, race and wealth when following three completely different people who experienced being laid off from their long tenured factories.
Highly recommend.
Highly recommend.
May 31, 2022
This felt like a book-length This American Life episode. The author follows two men (one white, one black) and a woman after their Indiana ball-bearing factory closes. There are amazing human moments that brought tears to my eyes and there were major eye-rolls (mainly when the author labored to account for her own privilege while interacting with the less fortunate- it's got to be done but still). The dilemma faced by workers when deciding to train or not train their Mexican replacements was particularly a strong section of the book. However, I felt there were a couple of avenues that were left unexplored (how our current society penalizes blue-collar workers and the poor through its financial set-up, infrastructure, and schools).
January 5, 2022
This is a phenomenal book. Stockman is an excellent journalist who skillfully weaves together the stories of three workers at an Indiana steel plant that fires everyone and moves the work to Mexico. The loss of income and meaning felt by these blue collar workers helps to explain why so many in the heartland voted for Trump and why they feel so utterly alienated from American politics. Reading American Made will give you a window into how globalization affects middle and lower income Americans and will help you to feel more empathetic to their plight. Which is what good journalism is supposed to do.
January 15, 2023
The main thing that will certainly stick with me is the resilience of these people in facing what would probably break those of us lucky to never have had to deal with the outsourcing of our job, leaving us and our communities in tatters. Even as some of the people the author describes think about certain things very differently than I do, I think we could still get along as we realize that what we all need in essence is a way to live productive and honest lives we can feel proud of.
March 29, 2022
This is a prolific book that explores the relationship between work and worth in America. In the most timely fashion this book proves that we receive so much more from our employment than income. There is a direct line between stable employment and politics as Stockman explores the divide between race and class as a capitalist manifesto designed to hold working class individuals solidly in the bottoming middle class.
Giving this book 4 stars ⭐️
This book reads like a microscope, magnifying intimately close to the 3 lives of working individuals as they come to terms with the closing of a factory in Indiana and magnifies out to the impact the lose of employment has on the: political, social and economic climate that we currently reside in.
There was a lot to like about this book and I think it is expertly written as Stockman proves the amount of personal, emotional and social work that she put into this book. However there were a few sticking points for me that held it back from a 5 star rating.
What I didn't like:
1. I actually expected this book to be a much more personal and intimate look into the lives of the 3 main characters Stockman follows around. If you're familiar with Chicago reporter Alex Kotlowitz's writing style in books like An American Summer, I was definitely expecting that. This is because the subtitle implies it is a study of people and their lives after losing their jobs. However this book was a bit more prescriptive than what I had originally imagined. Many chapters stepped away from our main characters to take on a journalistic essay writing style that after a while I found to overshadow the individual stories. Though I agreed with what she said I felt disconnected from our main characters because of how often we jumped back and forth between their world and the social and political commentary of our author.
2. This book does not occur in sequential order, which honestly is not the biggest of deals. However I did listen to it on audiobook and that made it quite difficult to follow because the time jumps and character jumps took me longer to adjust to simply because I couldn't physically pull up the text for reference.
3. There were moments in this book where Stockman's recognition of her own privilege didn't hit the mark for me. This is because it felt more like she was airing out her privilege to assuage herself of her guilt but not in a marked attempt to change her ways. I recognize that in a capitalist society we have what we have not solely based on our merit, and our sole actions will not immediately improve the lives of individuals who do not equally benefit from capitalism. But there was a particular point in the book (regarding a specific restaurant) that I felt like Stockman was simultaneously recognizing her privilege but had no problem relishing in the performance of it in a way that didn't ring authentic to me. She challenges both readers and the 3 main characters in this book to recognize their individual privileges and benefits, yet she does not seem to cater to this same need for personal development. In this way I felt like some points in the book her 'guilt' felt performative and obligatory rather than authentic. I personally don't think she needs to apologize for having all the rewards she's received in her life, however if that is the case she could've left out her performance of guilt.
Conclusion:
Overall this book, and hopefully more books to come, will open America's eyes to the interconnected nature between work, politics, health and overall well beginning. When a job determines the worth of your primary waking hours in a day it is hard to ignore the feeling of being undervalued when some people have so much and others have so little. However the next important conversation in our current state of America is hopefully how we can give people a way to support themselves and their loved ones in a sustainable way they can be proud of.
Giving this book 4 stars ⭐️
This book reads like a microscope, magnifying intimately close to the 3 lives of working individuals as they come to terms with the closing of a factory in Indiana and magnifies out to the impact the lose of employment has on the: political, social and economic climate that we currently reside in.
There was a lot to like about this book and I think it is expertly written as Stockman proves the amount of personal, emotional and social work that she put into this book. However there were a few sticking points for me that held it back from a 5 star rating.
What I didn't like:
1. I actually expected this book to be a much more personal and intimate look into the lives of the 3 main characters Stockman follows around. If you're familiar with Chicago reporter Alex Kotlowitz's writing style in books like An American Summer, I was definitely expecting that. This is because the subtitle implies it is a study of people and their lives after losing their jobs. However this book was a bit more prescriptive than what I had originally imagined. Many chapters stepped away from our main characters to take on a journalistic essay writing style that after a while I found to overshadow the individual stories. Though I agreed with what she said I felt disconnected from our main characters because of how often we jumped back and forth between their world and the social and political commentary of our author.
2. This book does not occur in sequential order, which honestly is not the biggest of deals. However I did listen to it on audiobook and that made it quite difficult to follow because the time jumps and character jumps took me longer to adjust to simply because I couldn't physically pull up the text for reference.
3. There were moments in this book where Stockman's recognition of her own privilege didn't hit the mark for me. This is because it felt more like she was airing out her privilege to assuage herself of her guilt but not in a marked attempt to change her ways. I recognize that in a capitalist society we have what we have not solely based on our merit, and our sole actions will not immediately improve the lives of individuals who do not equally benefit from capitalism. But there was a particular point in the book (regarding a specific restaurant) that I felt like Stockman was simultaneously recognizing her privilege but had no problem relishing in the performance of it in a way that didn't ring authentic to me. She challenges both readers and the 3 main characters in this book to recognize their individual privileges and benefits, yet she does not seem to cater to this same need for personal development. In this way I felt like some points in the book her 'guilt' felt performative and obligatory rather than authentic. I personally don't think she needs to apologize for having all the rewards she's received in her life, however if that is the case she could've left out her performance of guilt.
Conclusion:
Overall this book, and hopefully more books to come, will open America's eyes to the interconnected nature between work, politics, health and overall well beginning. When a job determines the worth of your primary waking hours in a day it is hard to ignore the feeling of being undervalued when some people have so much and others have so little. However the next important conversation in our current state of America is hopefully how we can give people a way to support themselves and their loved ones in a sustainable way they can be proud of.
January 24, 2022
Using three people to show how people deal with the loss of jobs seems pretty vague. That old stuff we learned in statistics classes : N = Sample Size comes to play. How can you generalize a nation based upon only three people who lose their jobs when an Indiana factory closes?
However, Farah Stockman does a nice job with that. She writes well enough to keep the reader going, showing a lot of the three peoples' home lives, they way of their living, their families and their hopes. John, one of the three profiled, wanted a nice house for his family. Shannon wanted money to help her disabled child. Willie just wanted to live happily.
Parts of the book include Stockman. She actually writes "I imagine..." and then writes what she supposes one of the three do when something happens. She also injects her own way of life as a contrast. She's from New York, liberal and well educated. It's a Stranger in a Strange Land kind of way in the Midwest for her. Obviously, she didn't vote for Trump and she seemed a bit surprised and interested in why Shannon did vote for Trump in the 2016 election.
Her three characters are indicative, I guess, of factory workers. There's the union guy, the woman who just wants to work and can handle a work environment of all men, and a black guy who has far reaching dreams and who, when life bats him down, keeps on going.
I misunderstood at first that American Made won the Pulitzer prize, based on the book's cover. Instead, Stockman won it for commentary about the effects of busing in Boston when she worked at the Globe. This book, I thought, was not Pulitzer-worthy. But it is still a good read and the fact I stayed with it, reading it in two days, was testament to how good it was.
However, Farah Stockman does a nice job with that. She writes well enough to keep the reader going, showing a lot of the three peoples' home lives, they way of their living, their families and their hopes. John, one of the three profiled, wanted a nice house for his family. Shannon wanted money to help her disabled child. Willie just wanted to live happily.
Parts of the book include Stockman. She actually writes "I imagine..." and then writes what she supposes one of the three do when something happens. She also injects her own way of life as a contrast. She's from New York, liberal and well educated. It's a Stranger in a Strange Land kind of way in the Midwest for her. Obviously, she didn't vote for Trump and she seemed a bit surprised and interested in why Shannon did vote for Trump in the 2016 election.
Her three characters are indicative, I guess, of factory workers. There's the union guy, the woman who just wants to work and can handle a work environment of all men, and a black guy who has far reaching dreams and who, when life bats him down, keeps on going.
I misunderstood at first that American Made won the Pulitzer prize, based on the book's cover. Instead, Stockman won it for commentary about the effects of busing in Boston when she worked at the Globe. This book, I thought, was not Pulitzer-worthy. But it is still a good read and the fact I stayed with it, reading it in two days, was testament to how good it was.
April 9, 2022
Thanks to Farah Stockman I can finally make sense of what’s happening in America. The political and cultural divide, the anger, the statistics.
She combines the storytelling of Studs Terkel (I literally couldn’t put the book down) with policy insights/analysis that explain WHY these stories unfold the way they do.
She forces me to abandon my simplistic (even smug) views of economic shifts and the politics of “the other side” and replace them with empathy and the motivation to bridge the divide instead of widen it.
A brilliant book.
She combines the storytelling of Studs Terkel (I literally couldn’t put the book down) with policy insights/analysis that explain WHY these stories unfold the way they do.
She forces me to abandon my simplistic (even smug) views of economic shifts and the politics of “the other side” and replace them with empathy and the motivation to bridge the divide instead of widen it.
A brilliant book.
February 14, 2022
This is a very balanced book. It tells the story of three individuals affected by the closure of a factory that moves to Mexico. The author is aware of her own biases as an upper middle class, well educated professional, but she doesn’t use her background to make judgments about policies or political statements. She just observes and reports. This type of book leads to a much greater understanding of “the other” (at least for me) than any policy book, of which I have read a lot. Investigative journalism at its best.
January 21, 2022
3.5 Stars. This book was good, but also totally middle of the road. It took me 4 days to read this, although it should really have taken me only 2. Although there were some interesting parts, there really was little or nothing that called me to pick up the audio, once I put it down, which is why it took me 4 days to complete. The author narrates the book and does a good job: I have found that when the author narrates their own work, it often is either done really well or really bad. In this case, I feel it was fortunately the former.
December 28, 2023
I learned so much from reading this book. It illuminated the intersection of unions, race, class, politics, and the impact of NAFTA and other policies on employment in a way that was throughly engrossing. Definitely recommend.
November 26, 2021
Probably the best nonfiction book I've read this year. Helps provide perspective on the 2016 election and class in America, among other things.
February 2, 2022
Such an interesting and well-researched read on a subject I’m very unfamiliar with. I’d say it was a solid 4.5 stars for me and well worth reading!
February 21, 2022
A engrossing, empathetic, honest, and intimate look at what happens to hardworking people when they lose their jobs.
October 16, 2022
This is a breathtaking and important book. It looks at how the closing of a factory and moving its manufacturing to Mexico affects 3 employees (a white man, a black man and a black woman). But in telling this story, the book deals with race, gender, class, institutionalized racism, globalization and trade agreements, and politics. This should be required reading for all high school students in the US.
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