A Company of One: Insecurity, Independence, and the New World of White-Collar Unemployment

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Synopsis
Being laid off can be a traumatic event. The unemployed worry about how they will pay their bills and find a new job. In the American economy's boom-and-bust business cycle since the 1980s, repeated layoffs have become part of working life. In A Company of One, Carrie M. Lane finds that the new culture of corporate employment, changes to the job search process, and dual-income marriage have reshaped how today's skilled workers view unemployment. Through interviews with seventy-five unemployed and underemployed high-tech white-collar workers in the Dallas area over the course of the 2000s, Lane shows that they have embraced a new definition of employment in which all jobs are temporary and all workers are, or should be, independent "companies of one."Following the experiences of individual jobseekers over time, Lane explores the central role that organized networking events, working spouses, and neoliberal ideology play in forging and reinforcing a new individualist, pro-market response to the increasingly insecure nature of contemporary employment. She also explores how this new perspective is transforming traditional ideas about masculinity and the role of men as breadwinners. Sympathetic to the benefits that this "company of one" ideology can hold for its adherents, Lane also details how it hides the true costs of an insecure workforce and makes collective and political responses to job loss and downward mobility unlikely.
Copyright:
2011

Book Details

Book Quality:
Publisher Quality
Book Size:
216 Pages
ISBN-13:
9780801461279
Related ISBNs:
9780801460791, 9780801449642, 9780801477270
Publisher:
Cornell University Press
Date of Addition:
Copyrighted By:
Cornell University
Adult content:
No
Language:
English
Has Image Descriptions:
No
Categories:
Nonfiction, Business and Finance, Social Studies, Politics and Government, Sociology
Reading Age:
18 and up
Submitted By:
Bookshare Staff
Usage Restrictions:
This is a copyrighted book.

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