The Political Economy of a Living Wage: Progressives, the New Deal, and Social Justice (Palgrave Studies in American Economic History)

This book tells the story behind President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s use of the phrase "living wage" in a variety of speeches, letters, and statements, and examines the degree to which programs of the New Deal reflected the ideas of a living wage movement that existed in the US for almost three decades before Roosevelt was elected president. Far from being a side issue, the previously unexplored living wage debate sheds light on the New Deal philosophy of social justice by identifying the value judgments behind its policies. Moving chronologically through history, this book's highlights include the revelation of a living wage agenda under the War Industry Board (WIB)'s National War Labor Board (NWLB) during World War I, the unearthing of long-forgotten literature from the 1920s and 30s that formed the foundation of Roosevelt's statements on a living wage, and the examination of contemporary studies that used a simple living wage formula combining collective bargaining, social insurance, and minimum wage as a standard for social justice used to measure the impact of New Deal polices. "Humor may surface in numerous and diverse contexts, which at the same time determine how humor works, its form, and its functions and consequences for interlocutors. Adopting a sociolinguistic and discourse analytic perspective, this study is aligned with approaches to humor exploring the variety of humorous genres, the wide range of sociopragmatic functions of humor, and the more or less dissimilar perceptions speakers may have concerning what humor is, what it means, and how it works. The chapters of this book propose a new theoretical approach to the analysis of humor by bringing context into focus. Furthermore, the study explores how we can teach about humor within a critical literacy framework creating classroom space for everyday humorous texts that are part of students' social realities, and simultaneously taking into account that humor may yield multiple, disparaging, and often conflicting interpretations. This book is intended to appeal to humor researchers from various disciplines (such as linguistics, media studies, cultural studies, literary studies, sociology, anthropology, folklore) as well as to professionals or researchers in education."--Publisher's description Front Matter....Pages i-x The Political Economy of a Living Wage....Pages 1-48 A Living Wage from World War I Through the Onset of the Great Depression....Pages 49-97 Planning a Living Wage: The National Industrial Recovery Act....Pages 99-138 A Useful and Remunerative Job: The National Labor Relations Act....Pages 139-159 Social Security: Protection from Poverty in Old Age and Unemployment....Pages 161-199 The Right to Earn Enough: The Fair Labor Standards Act....Pages 201-228 Collective Bargaining, Social Insurance, and the Minimum Wage: A Program for a Living Wage....Pages 229-255 Back Matter....Pages 257-292