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DSIL Investment Services LLC, Distributor. 4/21 VOLUME 45 NUMBER 6 ON THE COVER Trading Away the Planet 18 LABOR Voices From LABOR Deliveristas Unite the Margins The Future of New Two thousand delivery workers A conversation on labor and Orleans Is Union ride to demand bathroom access pleasure with Kemi Alabi and Hospitality workers are building an and protection from wage theft Tina Horn of the Echoing Ida enclave of labor power in the South BY LUIS FELIZ LEON and We Too collections 9 BY HAMILTON NOLAN 32 26 JUNE 2021 = IN THESE TIMES 1 No political movement can be healthy unless it has its own press to inform it, educate it and orient it. “ — IN THESE TIMES FOUNDER JAMES WEINSTEIN ” TABLE OF CONTENTS FOUNDING EDITOR & PUBLISHER JAMES WEINSTEIN (1926–2005) DISPATCHES FEATURES EDITOR & PUBLISHER Joel Bleifuss EXECUTIVE EDITOR Jessica Stites 6 An Artificial 18 Hot Air EXECUTIVE PUBLISHER Christopher Hass Vaccine Shortage BY KATE ARONOFF INTERIM MANAGING EDITOR Alex DiBranco BY JACOB SUGARMAN WEB EDITORS Miles Kampf-Lassin, 26 LABOR Jacob Sugarman 7 LABOR The Dream of a WISCONSIN EDITOR Alice Herman Latte, Small, Unionized New Orleans LABOR REPORTER Hamilton Nolan INVESTIGATIVE FELLOW Indigo Olivier Worker-Owned Is Coming True COPY EDITOR Bob Miller BY HARRY AUGUST BY HAMILTON NOLAN PROOFREADERS Sharon Bloyd-Peshkin, Rochelle Lodder 9 LABOR SENIOR EDITORS Patricia Aufderheide, Susan J. Douglas, David Moberg, Salim Deliveristas Unite DEPARTMENTS Muwakkil, Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) BY LUIS FELIZ LEON CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Kate Aronoff, 4 In Conversation Theo Anderson, Michael Atkinson, Frida Berrigan, Michelle Chen, Jude Ellison S. Doyle, Pete Karman, Kari VIEWPOINT 7 This Month in Lydersen, Moshe Z. Marvit, Jane Late Capitalism Miller, Shaun Richman, Slavoj Žižek 12 Build Back Fairer CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Dean Baker, 9 In Case You Missed It Rebecca Burns, Barbara Ehrenreich, BY THOMAS M. HANNA Jeremy Gantz, Leonard C. Goodman, Mindy 13 The Big Idea: Isser, Naomi Klein, Chris Lehmann, John Universal Child Care Nichols, Rick Perlstein, Micah Uetricht IN PERSPECTIVE ASSISTANT TO THE MANAGING EDITOR Clara Liang EDITORIAL INTERNS Catherine Henderson, 14 The Only Crisis Is Cruelty Daniela Ochoa-Bravo, Maryum ON THE COVER BY KHURY PETERSEN-SMITH Elnasseh, Paco Alvarez, Sadie Morris AND JOSUE DE LUNA NAVARRO Design by Rachel K. Dooley CREATIVE DIRECTOR Rachel K. Dooley Photo via Getty Images DESIGN ASSISTANT Matt Whitt 16 The Real Root Causes CARTOONS EDITOR Matt Bors BY AMELIA FRANK-VITALE CARTOONISTS Terry LaBan, Dan Perkins AND LAUREN HEIDBRINK DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Lauren Kostoglanis DEVELOPMENT COORDINATOR Jamie Hendry PUBLISHING ASSISTANT Caroline Reid CULTURE CIRCULATION DIRECTOR Rebecca Sterner IN THESE TIMES BOARD OF DIRECTORS 32 Voices From the Margins M. Nieves Bolaños, Tobita Chow, Kevin An interview with the co-editors Creighan, Dan Dineen, James Harkin, Anand Jahi, Robert Kraig, Paul Olsen, of two recent collections that give Rick Perlstein, Steven Saltzman, Stacy voice to those too often silenced Sutton, David Taber, William Weaver 38 Comics The work of In These Times writers is supported by the 40 In Those Times: Puffin Foundation. 77 Settlements to 200 Plus Our staff and writerspms 3015 arepms 130represented by these unions: 2 IN THESE TIMES + JUNE 2021 EDITORIAL A Judgment, But Not Justice expect I would have been angry to pay for relief bills and nonviolent offenders had the police officer who killed George were being released from prisons and jails be- Floyd been acquitted. But I also didn’t feel cause of the public health threat. To act like happy or celebratory, as many people did, a guilty verdict represents justice is to accept when Derek Chauvin was found guilty. I felt that, even in such circumstances, the appropri- numb. Empty. ate response to someone who was made IWhile they may have been sparked by unemployed by the pandemic and who the video of Derek Chauvin kneel- ing on George Floyd’s neck for an ex- cruciating 9.5 minutes, the uprisings Yes, last summer’s uprisings that swept across the world in sum- were a condemnation of mer 2020 were about more than just Derek Chauvin. But they these two men. The images struck a nerve in the American collective were also a response consciousness. to deep-seated, large- A stone-faced white police of- ficer kneels on the neck of an un- scale, systemic pain. armed, handcuffed, prone Black man accused of a petty and nonviolent was allegedly passing a counterfeit crime as he pleads for his life. The Black $20 bill is to lock him up. man gasps that he can’t breathe, calls for It was illegal to kill George Floyd; the guilty his mother and then goes limp. All the while, verdict affirms that. But it would have been the white police officer, his face cold and dis- wrong to arrest George Floyd even without inci- interested, keeps the pressure on, even after dent—a fact that seems to have been completely the Black man has died. It would be difficult lost in the wake of the murder conviction. to conjure an image that better epitomizes the Perhaps that’s why the conviction of Derek criminal justice system’s brutal and bureau- Chauvin left me feeling empty. One man has cratic suffocation of Black America over the been condemned, but the system he came to past several decades. represent is still intact. One of the core roles of Yes, last summer’s uprisings were a condem- a police force is to protect and serve capital. Po- nation of Derek Chauvin. But they were also a lice officers routinely do so by depriving hu- response to deep-seated, large-scale, system- man beings of their lives and liberty. That core ic pain. dynamic remains firmly in place. That pain was exacerbated by a pandem- Still, continued calls to defund the police ic. George Floyd was murdered during the and invest in life-giving systems give me hope. first wave of Covid-19 in the United States, in While some may take solace in the Chauvin which a disease buoyed by government inac- verdict as evidence that the system has right- tion and mismanagement was disproportion- ed itself, others remember it was always about ately impacting Black and Brown communities. more than just two men. True justice entails Like Derek Chauvin, the virus was deadly and grappling with the systems that shaped them unrelenting. For that reason, too, the image and their experiences, that sent them careen- resonated. ing toward each other and that ultimately de- Recall that at the time, U.S. unemployment stroyed them both. was hitting the highest rate since the Great De- — ANAND JAHI pression, the government was printing money IN THESE TIMES BOARD MEMBER JUNE 2021 = IN THESE TIMES 3 IN CONVERSATION GEORGIA ON OUR THE RURAL HOUSING WHERE NOMADLAND STEEL MILLS TO MIND P. 12 CRISIS P. 6 STRAYS P. 36 WINDMILLS P. 30 ing cars for Ford, Amazon why. This movie was about Sometimes donors sup- workers are up against a ti- a group of people who live port organizations that pro- WORKERS OF THE WORLD tan of industry. Jeff Bezos the “and then what?” mote ideas that others may UNITE AGAINST AMAZON took advantage of the new —Rachel Gray find controversial. Howev- and unregulated terrain of Powder Springs, Ga. er, disagreements over pol- e -commerce to behave as icy provide no justification ruthlessly as they did. Anyone watching Nomad- to malign a donor, the in- —Greg Sword land doesn’t need to be tent of the gift, nor our or- via Twitter told capitalism is to blame. ganization. The author and We’re poor, not stupid! the editors know better—but NOMADLAND-ERS —Missy Mueller published lies anyway. … MAY 2021 It’s worth noting, from a via Facebook Lawson Bader poor’s-eye view, that we’re CEO, DonorsTrust AMAZONIANS not just constantly wallow- TRUST US I would like consumers to ing in our misery (“What In These Times received the EXECUTIVE EDITOR JESSICA STITES RESPONDS: act in solidarity with work- Nomadland Gets Wrong following letter from Donor’s We feel confident in our opin- ers, in regard to the ris- About Poverty,” May). We Trust along with a retraction ion of DonorsTrust grantees. ing resistance to Amazon’s do find alternative forms request: I recommend our past report- abusive work conditions of recreation, alternative It is surprising that In ing on how organizations like (“Workers of the World sources of beauty and every- These Times allowed a de- the State Policy Network and Unite Against Amazon,” day sources of happiness.