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Years after the Great Recession, the economy is still weak, and an unprecedented number of workers have sunk into long spells of unemployment. Cut Loose provides a vivid and moving account of the experiences of some of these men and women, through the example of a historically important group: autoworkers. Their well-paid jobs on the assembly lines built a strong middle class in the decades after World War II. But today, they find themselves beleaguered in a changed economy of greater inequality and risk, one that favors the well-educated—or well-connected. Their declining fortunes in recent decades tell us something about what the white-collar workforce should expect to see in the years ahead, as job-killing technologies and the shipping of work overseas take away even more good jobs. Cut Loose offers a poignant look at how the long-term unemployed struggle in today's unfair economy to support their families, rebuild their lives, and overcome the shame and self-blame they deal with on a daily basis. It is also a call to action—a blueprint for a new kind of politics, one that offers a measure of grace in a society of ruthless advancement.

Economically depressed communities across North America have opened casinos based on the promise of creating “good jobs.” Some scholars find that workers benefit from casinos via employment and wage growth, while others find that casinos exploit host communities, including their workers. Yet, little research addresses whom casinos employ and how workers experience the quality of employment. Existing research is based on geographic areas that house multiple casinos where workers have the mobility to move between different casino operators. Across North America, however, casinos are being adopted in economically depressed areas and in limited-licence states with large distances between casinos. Using the case study of Casino Windsor – located in Canada’s economically struggling automotive capital, Windsor, Ontario – this article speaks to whether casinos offer “good jobs” when a single casino exists in an economically struggling area. Based on 48 interviews with Windsor stakeholders and casino workers, media coverage, and descriptive statistics, these findings provide an alternative story of the employment implications of casino development when casino workers are immobile. The immobility of Casino Windsor workers results from a high unemployment rate, the absence of other employment offering comparable remuneration, and an international border. This scenario allows management to rule through disciplinary actions while still reaping the benefits of worker “loyalty” and effort. With states/provinces justifying casino developments to economically devitalized host communities by promising the creation of “good jobs,” researchers and policymakers must consider whether such developments will create and potentially exploit a captive labour supply, leading to the development of not-so-good casino jobs.

Introduction Research into work reintegration following cardiovascular disease onset is limited in its clinical and individual focus. There is no research examining worker experience in context during the return to work process. Methods Qualitative case study method informed by applied ethnography. Worker experience was assessed through longitudinal in-depth interviews with 12 workers returning to work following disabling cardiac illness. Workplace context (Canadian auto manufacturing plant) was assessed through site visits and meetings with stakeholders including occupational health personnel. Data was analyzed using constant comparison and progressive coding. Results Twelve men (43–63 years) participated in the study. Results revealed that unyielding production demands and performance monitoring pushed worker capacities and caused “insidious stress”. Medical reassurance was important in the workers’ decisions to return to work and stay on the job but medical restrictions were viewed as having limited relevance owing to limited understanding of work demands. Medical sanction was important for transient absence from the workplace as well as permanent disability. Cardiac rehabilitation programs were beneficial for lifestyle modification and building exercise capacity, but had limited benefit on work reintegration. Occupational health provided monitoring and support during work reintegration. Conclusions Medical reassurance can be an important influence on worker representations of disease threat. Medical advice as it pertained to work activities was less valued as it lacked considerations of work conditions. Cardiac rehabilitation lacked intensity and relevance to work demands. Occupational health was reassuring for workers and played an important role in developing return to work plans.

This paper examines employment in the Canadian automobile industry in terms of Beck's (1992) \"Risk Society\". We demonstrate that risk transcends terms of employment, to encompass injury, lay-off, and displacement. Work becomes increasingly risky with the blurring of employment relations within and among three geographic scales: the globe, the locale and the plant. We argue for an embodied account of the experience of risk which emphasizes the inscription of different temporal and spatial configurations of work on the body.

Unions in the current environment are facing renewed pressures to demonstrate internal democracy and accountability. In this context, the Public Review Board (PRB) of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) deserves attention. The PRB is a unique institution within the Canadian labour movement: a body outside the union which has the power to make final and binding decisions on issues raised by union members. This paper considers the contribution of the PRB as a support for democratic renewal. The evolution of the PRB, from its origin in 1950s America to its current Canadian embodiment, is described. The decisions of the PRB over its two-decade history in Canada are analyzed and assessed. While recognizing the lasting influence of the narrow, procedural vision charted by the PRB early in its history, the author concludes that the CAW’s PRB is an innovation that merits wider recognition.

The goal of this paper is to link the development of union training initiatives and their relationship to state labor market policy to an emerging literature on trade unions in industrial geography. In particular, I examine labor's involvement in state policy in Canada and consider the impact it has had on the direction of these initiatives at the federal, provincial, and sectoral levels, with particular reference to the Canadian Labor Force Development Board (CLFDB), the Ontario Training and Adjustment Board (OTAB), and sectoral training initiatives by the Canadian Auto Workers and the United Steel Workers of America. Researchers in geography and industrial relations have linked post-Fordism to an enhancement of local union strategies and have suggested that one possible configuration of skill development under an emerging Schumpeterian Workfare State would include labor as an important stakeholder-especially at the regional level in a high-skill/high-wage virtuous circle of development. However, in Canada labor has been organized historically on a largely local level and has been relatively weak in the formulation of state policy, nationally and provincially. If anything, labor has sought to overcome the legacy of localism. Although unions differ in central-local relations, overall they have fought for effective national, provincial, and sectoral representation in these initiatives. Labor has been able to achieve some input into this process, but the success or failure of these programs reflects more on national, provincial, and sectoral institutions, in particular the structure of capital, than on local factors or strategies by labor.

U.S. SOFTWOOD FINDING STOKES JOB FEARS IN CANADA Fears of job losses are growing among Canadian softwood producers after the U.S. International Trade Commission said today that an initial determination found lumber from Canada harmed American producers.

Summary This paper investigates the role of “women’s issues” in the decision to join unions by examining a successful organizing drive in a predominantly female workplace. The main focus of the discussion is the identification of women’s issues where they were not immediately apparent to workers and union representatives. The theoretical question raised by this case study is the extent to which women workers’ relationship to unions is similar to or different from men workers’. Contemporary industrial relations discourse tends to emphasize the similarities between women and men, without taking into account well-documented differences in women’s paid and unpaid work and union experiences. From a feminist perspective, the conclusion that gender is unimportant in organizing campaigns often rests on an inadequate analysis of what constitutes women’s workplace/union issues.