5LL #13 - Amazon, Economic Anxiety, Iceland Women's Strike, Leisure, Communist Bookstores

Democrats, Take Note: If You Want To Raise Wages, Put Pressure On Employers
Matt Bruenig, The Washington Post
When Amazon announced Tuesday that it was raising all of its employees’ wages to at least $15 per hour, it helped prove a point about labor markets that has fallen out of favor in recent years: Wage levels are determined as much by social forces as they are by market forces.
The Color of Economic Anxiety
Malaika Jabali, Current Affairs
So why didn’t black voters turn out for Clinton? Even accounting for the thousands of potential voters who were likely harmed by Wisconsin’s incessant suppression tactics, studies show that voter suppression was among the least important factors affecting black turnout in Wisconsin. In search of some answers, I trekked to Milwaukee last fall to talk to some of the city’s black residents about why they stayed home.
The Day Iceland's Women Went On Strike
Kirstie Brewer, BBC News
Forty years ago, the women of Iceland went on strike - they refused to work, cook and look after children for a day. It was a moment that changed the way women were seen in the country and helped put Iceland at the forefront of the fight for equality.
Did the Fun Work?
Miya Tokumitsu, The Baffler
Both the spoiled Prodigal Son and the guy sipping bottom-shelf whiskey in front of the supermarket all day are doing it wrong. Their leisure is excessive, undeserved, and not directed at self-improvement. There has long been a proper way to do leisure, and now there are more apparatuses and feedback systems than ever to tell us how good we are at it.
The Forgotten World of Communist Bookstores
Joshua Clark Davis, Jacobin
While largely forgotten today, communist bookstores were one of the most important public spaces for Marxism in the United States in the twentieth century. Most Americans didn’t personally know a communist. But in cities across the country, radicals made their presence known at unassuming bookstores.
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