this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2026
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Work Reform
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A place to discuss positive changes that can make work more equitable, and to vent about current practices. We are NOT against work; we just want the fruits of our labor to be recognized better.
Our Philosophies:
- All workers must be paid a living wage for their labor.
- Income inequality is the main cause of lower living standards.
- Workers must join together and fight back for what is rightfully theirs.
- We must not be divided and conquered. Workers gain the most when they focus on unifying issues.
Our Goals
- Higher wages for underpaid workers.
- Better worker representation, including but not limited to unions.
- Better and fewer working hours.
- Stimulating a massive wave of worker organizing in the United States and beyond.
- Organizing and supporting political causes and campaigns that put workers first.
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In common usage, the "____ class" terms refer to income/wealth levels, and the social constructs derive from that.
More importantly, the semantics of the comment are completely irrelevant to the actual message being conveyed.
We all belong to any number of different overlapping classes when considered through different paradigms. My point here was that talking about the "middle class" as though it had a place in political class theory is confusing categories. There is nothing between the ruling class and the working class and I don't know how to put that simpler. Those are the classes we are concerned about when discussing work reform. Political classes aren't about our income or whether we prefer Evian or Fiji.
Some might say you have a renting class and a home owning class. And this relates to political discourse in a very real way especially on a local level where property taxes are concerned. I don’t think it’s fair to call the home owning class the “ruling class”. I’ll agree that the middle class is being destroyed, but I don’t think it’s fair to say it never existed. Even what they used to call upper middle class is a thing. These are not CEOs making 30x per OPs 1978 figure. But they make maybe 2x to 4x the average household income. (Think doctors, lawyers, certain types of managers.) their lifestyle will be very different from the renting class.
Good lord, replace the words "middle class" with whatever you want to use to describe "population group that can use one income to support buying a home, having a spouse and 2.1 children, and saving enough to retire at 65".
The point is the massive increase in top level pay, not whatever term you are using to refer to the rest.