Confronting Capitalism: How Work Got So Bad

Why does every new technology seem to make work harder and not easier? In 1974, Harry Braverman published a seminal text Labor and Monopoly Capital to answer that question. Combining a careful study of scientific management and technological innovation with several of Marx’s key concepts, Braverman explained why workers under capitalism are gradually transformed into mere cogs in the machine.

On the latest episode of Confronting Capitalism, Vivek Chibber and Melissa Naschek discuss the process of managers breaking down workers’ skills and why work under capitalism tends to degrade rather than fulfill us.

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Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber is produced by Catalyst: A Journal of Theory and Strategy, and published by Jacobin. Music by Zonkey.