{"product_id":"the-way-we-build-restoring-dignity-to-construction-work-9780252087332","title":"The Way We Build: Restoring Dignity to Construction Work","description":"The construction trades once provided unionized craftsmen a route to the middle class and a sense of pride and dignity often denied other blue-collar workers. Today, union members still earn wages and benefits that compare favorably to those of college graduates. But as union strength has declined over the last fifty years, a growing non-union sector offers lower compensation and more hazardous conditions, undermining the earlier tradition of upward mobility. Revitalization of the industry depends on unions shedding past racial and gender discriminatory practices, embracing organizing, diversity, and the new immigrant workforce, and preparing for technological changes. \u003cp\u003e Mark Erlich blends long-view history with his personal experience inside the building trades to explain one of our economy's least understood sectors. Erlich's multifaceted account includes the dynamics of the industry, the backdrop of union policies, and powerful stories of everyday life inside the trades. He offers a much-needed overview of construction's past and present while exploring roads to the future. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eMark Erlich\u003c\/b\u003e is the Wertheim Fellow at the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program and the retired Executive Secretary Treasurer of the New England Regional Council of Carpenters. His books include \u003ci\u003eLabor at the Ballot Box\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"University of Illinois Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50525912301842,"sku":"9780252087332","price":23.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_3a38bc5e-8583-48be-b6d7-89eb2af00ad6.jpg?v=1731248840","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-way-we-build-restoring-dignity-to-construction-work-9780252087332","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}