The Moral Underground

[question everything]

A book review on TIME


The Skimmer
By Gilbert Cruz Monday, Dec. 14, 200

The Moral Underground: How Ordinary Americans Subvert an Unfair Economy

By Lisa Dodson

New Press; 227 pages

If only this book had been published in 2007. Then the hundreds of people interviewed by Lisa Dodson would have been able to pass along an important piece of advice: What's good for business is not necessarily good for America. For Dodson and her subjects, American corporations are amoral entities that continue to build their wealth on the backs of the nation's low-income workers. Helping the less fortunate in this context becomes a form of civil and corporate disobedience, and Dodson, a professor of sociology at Boston College, isn't lacking in examples. There's the supervisors who tweak time cards so that employees can take care of their kids, the school nurse who keeps cots in her office so that students in difficult family situations can catch a few hours' sleep, and the doctor who flouts insurance regulations in order to prescribe medicine for an entire household. All see their behavior as necessary and moral acts of conscience. As one subject says, "Sometimes you just have to level the playing field a little."



http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1945359,00.html

[intheflow]

1. I thought this was going to be a post about DU dedicated to

all the right wing talking points that seem to be popping up everywhere on here these days. Glad to see it's a book rec! :D

K&R and off to reserve it at the library. :hi:

[question everything]

12. Yes, I thought that the word "underground" will get some attention

even though when I first read it the word just went by me.

Back at you :hi:

[Warpy]

2. That's right, like sacking out families from the reservation

in the waiting room, illegally giving them blankets so they can catch a few hours' sleep because there is no way anyone from the rez can afford a city hotel room. Or sneaking in life partners after hours when the phobe family has banned them. Or looking the other way when someone you know steals from your store because you know that person is living on the street and has mental problems. Or looking the other way when kids you don't know steal the condoms you keep on the shelf instead of in back of the counter like management wants because you know those kids are poor but trying to be responsible. If you're running the store for a soul sucking corporation, you're allowed a certain percentage of "shrinkage" from shoplifting and spoilage. If you're running it for a friend, you tend to make up the difference out of your own pocket if that friend isn't looking the other way, too.

Sometimes a higher morality is at work and causes us to break rules and look the other way and I would hope most of us here on DU have had an occasion to do it and have done it. I know I have.

I'm glad there's enough of it going on in our corporatized world to fill a book. It gives me hope.

[Sinti]

6. +1 well said

[question everything]

13. I hope that someone (you?) actually has done this

and this is not just a theoretical idea.

[Warpy]

16. Guilty as charged on all counts

which is why I chose those particular examples.

[walldude]

3. Thanks.. if it weren't for you I probably would have not seen this book

which just shot up to number 2 on my reading list. If I can ever get through King's current 1100 page screed.

[pinto]

4. Kick. Thanks for the find.

:kick:

[CrispyQ]

5. "What's good for business is not necessarily good for America."

I'd like to see a candidate run on that platform.

[Nikki Stone1]

7. I wonder why Time is flouting this book now.

....

[question everything]

8. Because... it was just published? (nt)

[intheflow]

10. It actually hasn't even been published yet.

Due to hit the shelves on December 9.

[Odin2005]

9. Ooh, I'll have to look for that, looks like a excellent book!

[jwirr]

11. As a social worker I and a friend once doctored the papers of two

clients that were going to be kicked out of an activity center because they did not fit the entrance requirements even though they had been there since it opened. They had strokes instead of developmental disabilities. They were a loved part of the program and would not be living much longer so we kept them in.

I think this is done by a great deal of people if they can get by with it. Many doctors, nurses. pharmacists, teachers and social workers have help to keep my daughter safe and well. I do not remember on single minister going out of his way for her - which is a shame.

[question everything]

14. Thank you for this. Perhaps there is still hope for the human race (nt)

[BrklynLiberal]

15. thank you very much for this headsup.

:thumbsup: :hi:

[Echo In Light]

17. K&R

[Vidar]

18. K&R.

[mdmc]

19. --

[asdjrocky]

20. Can't wait to read this.

[amborin]

21. nothing new in this book! many/most of these practices have been discussed at length in the

sociology of work literature