Vox Populi

A curated webspace for Poetry, Politics, and Nature with over 20,000 daily subscribers and over 8,000 archived posts.

William Trowbridge: Breakdown

The foreman led me into a cavernous room that took up most of the ground floor, where three huge machines unspooled 16-ton rolls of tin plate into sheets to be turned into cans. The machines resembled aircraft carriers, with ladders to the control towers.

May 30, 2025 · 4 Comments

Jon Queally: Khanna Sounds Alarm as Thousands of Factory Workers Laid Off Amid Trump Tariff Chaos

“Imagine if federal worker unions and Democratic Party officials showed up at the plant gate of a company that was about to close its doors,” said one labor advocate. “Why aren’t the Democrats doing this?”

April 7, 2025 · 6 Comments

Rebecca Gordon: Republicans Have Plans for Working People

And You’re Not Going to Like Them

April 12, 2024 · 4 Comments

James Laughlin: Easter in Pittsburgh

the telephone rang it
was Mr. Shupstead at the
mill they had had to use
tear gas father made a
special prayer right a-
way for God’s protection

March 31, 2024 · 13 Comments

Julia Conley: Nationwide Federal Order Bars Starbucks From Firing Workers for Union Activity

“Starbucks continues to violate the law in egregious ways, thus requiring a nationwide cease and desist order,” said the general counsel for the National Labor Relations Board.

February 21, 2023 · 2 Comments

Mel Packer: The Bend on the River Road from Homestead

A falling down, bullet-pocked sheet metal wall
Once erected to mark the edges of the 
South Side Jones and Laughlin steel mill

January 31, 2023 · 3 Comments

Video: Abigail Disney | Dignity isn’t a privilege. It’s a worker’s right.

In this bold talk, activist and filmmaker Abigail Disney imagines a world where companies have a moral obligation to place their workers above shareholders, calling on Disney (and all corporations) to offer respect, dignity and a living wage to everyone who works for them.

July 26, 2022 · Leave a comment

At Biennial Meeting, American Association of University Professors Votes to Affiliate with American Federation of Teachers

Historic partnership will strengthen both organizations and advance American higher education.

June 20, 2022 · 6 Comments

Abby Zimet: The Ludlow Massacre

Last week marked the 108th anniversary of what Wallace Stegner called “one of the bleakest and blackest episodes of American labor history,” when armed thugs hired by John Rockefeller Jr. burned down … Continue reading

April 26, 2022 · Leave a comment

Robert Gibb: Frances Perkins at the Homestead Post Office

Minimum wage, overtime, social security . . .
A storm of progress to the angel of history,
The debris of paradise scattered about
The aggrieved, beseeching crowds.

September 30, 2021 · Leave a comment

Video: There is Power in a Union by Joe Hill (with bio and lyrics)

From San Diego up to Maine,
In every mine and mill,
Where working-men defend their rights,
It’s there you find Joe Hill

May 1, 2021 · Leave a comment

Mike Schneider: A Hammer not a Mirror

A Discussion with Anne Feeney & Utah Phillips

February 17, 2021 · 2 Comments

Faiz Shakir: Democrats Must Commit Themselves to the Needs of Non-College Educated Workers

Workers without college degrees have suffered most from recent decades of neoliberal fetishization with globalization, unregulated open markets, and corporate-friendly free trade.

November 23, 2020 · Leave a comment

Rebecca Gordon: Guns, Germs and Smoke

UNITE-HERE! Canvassers take on Trump in Nevada.

October 22, 2020 · 1 Comment

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