Naomi Cahn, et al., "Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy" (Simon & Schuster, 2023)

Apr 3, 2024

Naomi Cahn discusses the challenges women face in the workplace, highlighting wage gaps, systemic discrimination, and the impact of a 'winner-take-all' economy. The podcast explores gender disparities in education, occupation, and corporate environments, addressing issues like whistleblowing, harassment, and unfair treatment. It also touches on the empowering effects of the Me Too movement in promoting accountability and systemic change.

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Introduction

00:00 • 4min

Gender Disparities in the Workplace

03:45 • 13min

Exploring Gender Disparities in Education, Occupation, and Wages

16:32 • 5min

Unfair Treatment of Women in Corporate Environments

21:53 • 19min

Impact of Private Equity on Healthcare and Worker Rights Amidst Pandemic Challenges

40:41 • 3min

Teacher's Courageous Stand Against Scapegoating and Education Reforms

43:45 • 5min

Empowering Women Through the Me Too Movement

48:34 • 17min

A stirring, comprehensive look at the state of women in the workforce--why women's progress has stalled, how our economy fosters unproductive competition, and how we can fix the system that holds women back.

In an era of supposed great equality, women are still falling behind in the workplace. Even with more women in the workforce than in decades past, wage gaps continue to increase. It is the most educated women who have fallen the furthest behind. Blue-collar women hold the most insecure and badly paid jobs in our economy. And even as we celebrate high-profile representation--women on the board of Fortune 500 companies and our first female vice president--women have limited recourse when they experience harassment and discrimination.

Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy (Simon & Schuster, 2023) explains that the system that governs our economy--a winner-take-all economy--is the root cause of these myriad problems. The WTA economy self-selects for aggressive, cutthroat business tactics, which creates a feedback loop that sidelines women. The authors, three legal scholars, call this feedback loop "the triple bind" if women don't compete on the same terms as men, they lose; if women do compete on the same terms as men, they're punished more harshly for their sharp elbows or actual misdeeds; and when women see that they can't win on the same terms as men, they take themselves out of the game (if they haven't been pushed out already). With odds like these stacked against them, it's no wonder women feel like, no matter how hard they work, they can't get ahead.

Fair Shake is not a "fix the woman" book; it's a "fix the system" book. It not only diagnoses the problem of what's wrong with the modern economy, but shows how, with awareness and collective action, we can build a truly just economy for all.

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