Under COVID-19, low-wage service sector workers found themselves as essential workers vulnerable to intensified precarity. Based on in-depth interviews with a sample of 52 low-wage service workers interviewed first in Summer 2019 and then in the last two weeks of April 2020, we argue that COVID-19 has created new and heightened dimensions of precarity for low-wage workers. They experience (1) moments of what we call precarious stability, in which an increase in hours and predictable schedules is accompanied by unpredictability in the tasks workers are assigned, (2) increased threats to bodily integrity, and (3) experiences of fear and anxiety as background conditions of work and intensified emotional labor. The impacts of COVID-19 on workers’ lives warrant an expanded conceptualization of precarity that captures the dynamic and shifting nature of precarious stability and must incorporate workers’ limited control over their bodily integrity and emotions as core components of precarious working conditions.
Through a qualitative analysis of gender‐inclusive meetup groups in the US technology sector, this article offers a theory of postfeminist communities to identify how community organizing can take a postfeminist turn. Gender‐inclusive meetups are public, often free groups or organizations where participants have access to training, mentorship and support. Groups import postfeminist values of choice, empowerment, individualism and entrepreneurship into their community organizing efforts to address workplace gender inequities. Groups employ three strategies to improve the status of women and non‐binary people in the tech industry: (i) organizing a supportive community rooted in professionalism and entrepreneurialism; (ii) offering skills development in a safe environment; and (iii) training participants on how to take individual action against discrimination. While postfeminist communities are able to successfully cultivate supportive groups of participants who organize outside of the workplace, strategies focused on individual‐level changes ultimately do little to disrupt organization‐level gender inequities.
A total of 16 percent of hourly workers and 36 percent of workers paid on some other basis experience unstable work schedules due to irregular, on-call, rotating, or split shifts, which negatively impact workers’ ability to manage family responsibilities, finances, and health. Primarily drawing on data from in-depth interviews conducted in Oregon in 2016, this study expands research on how workers navigate through “bad jobs” by exploring the ways in which they respond in an attempt to manage the individual impacts of precarious work arrangements. We found that workers respond to unpredictable scheduling in four ways: they acquiesce, self-advocate, quit, or directly oppose employers. Our findings highlight the “impossible choices” workers face as they negotiate prevalent, unpredictable work conditions, juggle work-life obligations, and struggle to remain employed. We conclude with fair week, work policy recommendations.
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