#103 How the American Dream Became Temporary w/ Louis Hyman

The Road to Now

Benjamin Sawyer

Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 628 Ratings

🗓️ 20 August 2018

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

"Make American Great Again" is not a precise slogan, but it did capture the sense of anxiety many Americans feel about work in the 21st century. The "gig economy," in which more and more American workers rely on multiple jobs, is certainly different from the job market just three generations ago, when employers offered the stability of life-long employment and the promise of a pension-funded retirement. In this episode, Bob and Ben speak with Cornell University's Louis Hyman about the origins of the so-called "good job" in the mid-20th century, and the forces that led us from there to what he calls the "second industrious revolution." He also explains how we might structure the economy of the 21st century in a way that offers the freedom of the gig economy without the insecurity that so many face under our current institutions.

Dr. Louis Hyman is a historian of work and business at the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University, where he also directs the Institute for Workplace Studies in New York City. His book Temp: How American Work, American Business, and the American Dream Became Temporary (Viking) will be released on August 21, 2018. "Make American Great Again" is not a precise slogan, but it did capture the sense of anxiety many Americans feel about work in the 21st century. The "gig economy," in which more and more American workers rely on multiple jobs, is certainly different from the job market just three generations ago, when employers offered the stability of life-long employment and the promise of a pension-funded retirement. In this episode, Bob and Ben speak with Cornell University's Louis Hyman about the origins of the so-called "good job" in the mid-20th century, and the forces that led us from there to what he calls the "second industrious revolution." He also explains how we might structure the economy of the 21st century in a way that offers the freedom of the gig economy without the insecurity that so many face under our current institutions.

The Road to Now is produced by Bob Crawford and Dr. Benjamin Sawyer. For more on this an all our other episodes, visit www.TheRoadToNow.com

The Road to Now is part of the Osiris Podcast Network.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Osiris.
0:01.0	Oh, Cyrus.
0:02.0	Hey, this is Brendan from Umphreys McGee.
0:05.5	This podcast is part of the Osiris Podcast family.
0:08.7	Osiris is a growing community of music and culture podcasts, connecting music fans with
0:13.6	conversation, commentary, and of course, lots of music.
0:17.1	Osiris works in partnership with Relics Magazine.
0:20.8	Bob, we have a big week coming up this week for the podcast, huh? Yes, we do. We're going to do two episodes this week. Do you remember how, like, three weeks ago, we were like, we're not going to be doing so many episodes anymore? Yeah, we were going to quit. We're ready to quit. We're ready to quit. And now we have two episodes in a week. We're excited because, well, the conversation we had in D.C. with Glover Park Group, with Olivier Knox and Bill Plant, it was timely. So we wanted to get it out. But also our friend Louis Heimann, who was the author of this fantastic new book, Temp, it's coming out Tuesday. So we wanted to get
0:55.8	the episode out for you guys the week it's coming out so you can jump on that. You know,
0:59.8	you don't want to be at a party and people are talking about that book. And you don't know about it
1:03.8	because we sat on the episode. Yeah, temp is about the gig economy and the history of the gig
1:08.4	economy that we think of the gig economy as being a very
1:12.1	21st century phenomenon but it's not at all actually the gig economy goes back to the
1:19.4	1940s yeah maybe just after World War II so it's a great book and it's very applicable to the moment we're in now and I'm sure a lot of
1:32.3	a lot of you out there are a part of the gig economy we're all affected by it no longer do you get
1:40.7	out of college or high school and get a job with a company?
1:45.0	And that's who you work for for 40 years and you retire with them and you have your benefits.
1:51.0	It's a completely different system these days.
1:56.0	Yeah, and we're at Wolftrap where the Ava brothers are playing tonight.
1:59.0	We're on a bus and I got here. We are not, you know, we're a little backlit, but we're at Wolftrap where the Ava brothers are playing tonight. We're on a bus and I got here. We are not, but we're a little backlit, but we can fix that. I got here right on a lift. Yes. I was in D.C. and I took the lift out here. It's everywhere around us, you know. As musicians, you're part of the gig economy, right? Yeah, well, we play gigs. Yeah, but I mean, it's yours, right?
2:19.3	You don't have an employer that pays you benefits, you know?
2:22.3	No, yeah, that's right.
	...

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