Jacobin Radio: Louisiana Labor Struggle w/ Jesse Baum & David Williams

Jacobin Radio

Jacobin

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4.7 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 21 October 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Suzi talks to Capital & Main reporter Jesse Baum and David Williams, a Dollar General stocker and organizer with Step Up Louisiana, about how workers are fighting for dignity and better working conditions in “right-to-work” states — places where an anti-union climate, legal roadblocks, and intimidation make winning union recognition nearly impossible.

Dollar Store workers in Louisiana organized with Step Up Louisiana and won tangible gains despite the system being rigged against them. They used the Pre-Majority Unionism strategy — acting like a union without having one — walking out, marching on shareholders, and forcing companies to raise wages and improve safety and respect on the job. We talk about whether this organizing could chart a path forward for labor in the US’s low-wage sectors, short of unionizing.

Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman features conversations with leading thinkers and activists, with a focus on labor, the economy, and protest movements.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Jacobin Radio. I'm Susie Wiseman.
0:24.2	Today we're going to look at how workers are fighting for dignity and better working conditions in so-called right-to-work states, places where the anti-union climate, legal roadblocks, and intimidation make winning union recognition seem nearly impossible.
0:38.9	Across the country, there are some $38,000 dollar store workers at Dollar General,
0:44.3	Family Dollar, and Dollar Tree, where short staffing, poverty wages, and dangerous conditions
0:49.8	are the norm.
0:50.8	Today we're going to highlight a successful campaign in Louisiana where workers
0:55.2	stood up for safer workplaces and better pay. And instead of waiting for legal recognition,
1:01.5	these workers are organizing and acting like a union without one. It's an approach known as
1:07.3	pre-majority unionism and it can deliver real gains. My guests are Jesse Baum,
1:12.4	reporter for Capitol in Maine, and David Williams, a dollar general worker and organizer
1:17.1	with Step Up, Louisiana. We're going to talk about how these campaigns are winning raises
1:21.8	and safety audits through direct action and solidarity outside the formal protections of the NLRB, which is now hobbled
1:30.0	under Trump's second administration. When the law fails to protect workers, they're proving that
1:35.2	collective action still works and may well be showing us the future of the labor movement itself.
1:41.1	All this when our program returns in just a moment.
1:59.4	This episode of Jacobin Radio is brought to you by Revol Press.
2:03.8	The utopianism of the early internet has given way to a far-right technocracy, threatening the promise of democracy. In a new book called Gothic capitalism,
2:10.5	Adam Turrell argues that only a working class art movement can avert catastrophe. Author Holly
2:16.4	Lewis calls Gothic capitalism capitalism essential reading for all
2:19.6	who refused to surrender to arts power. Turrell's ideas are an incitement, a reckoning, and perhaps
2:26.5	even a way forward. Find Gothic capitalism at Rivalpress.com. That's R-E-V-O-L-Press.com. That's r-evol-press.com.
2:37.6	This is Jacobin Radio. I'm Susie Wiseman. Capital and Maine reporter Jesse Bown and David Williams,
	...

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