Ben Waterhouse on the Dream and Reality of Self Employment

Ben Waterhouse on the Dream and Reality of Self Employment

One recent study found that 81% of businesses in the United States have zero employees. That is, they are run by sole proprietors, working for and by themselves, The ideal of self-employment has become dominant in our culture, too. More Americans than ever dream of becoming an entrepreneur, an independent owner, a founder.

But for all of its prevalence in our economy and in our imaginations, the origins of this impulse are a bit hazy. When did so many of us begin to idolize self-employment? What might it reveal about broader shifts in the employment landscape in the 20th and 21st centuries? In his new book, One Day I'll Work for Myself: The Dream and Delusion That Conquered America, Ben Waterhouse answers precisely those questions. He explains how the rise of self-employment dates back to the economic transformations of the 1970s and intensified during the decades of precarity that followed. In our wide-ranging conversation, we touch on everything from franchise jurisprudence to the gig economy to the surprising story behind the Sam Adams beer company.

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Joan Flores-Villalobos on How Black Women's Labor Made the Panama Canal

Joan Flores-Villalobos on How Black Women's Labor Made the Panama Canal

When it was completed in 1914, the Panama Canal nearly halved the travel time between the U.S. West Coast and Europe and revolutionized trade and travel between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. It's c...

4 Touko 202349min

Christy Thornton on Mexico, Development, and Governing the Global Economy

Christy Thornton on Mexico, Development, and Governing the Global Economy

In this month's episode, Christy Thornton discusses the surprising influence of post-revolutionary Mexico on some of the twentieth century's most important international economic institutions, includi...

5 Huhti 202342min

Special Episode on the Military and the Market

Special Episode on the Military and the Market

This month, we welcomed Jennifer Mittelstadt back to the show, joined by Mark Wilson, to discuss their new edited volume, The Military and the Market. Moving beyond familiar topics like defense spendi...

7 Maalis 202346min

Allan Lumba on Monetary Authorities in the American Colonial Philippines

Allan Lumba on Monetary Authorities in the American Colonial Philippines

In this episode, historian Allan Lumba explores how the United States wielded monetary authority in the colonial Philippines, including the role of money as a tool for countering decolonization, entre...

2 Helmi 202338min

Chad Pearson on Klansmen, Employer Vigilantes, and Labor Suppression in the Long Nineteenth Century

Chad Pearson on Klansmen, Employer Vigilantes, and Labor Suppression in the Long Nineteenth Century

This month's episode takes listeners back in time to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a time of significant labor unrest. At the time, employers, often with government support, went to great le...

5 Joulu 202235min

Ghassan Moazzin on Foreign Banks and the Making of Modern China

Ghassan Moazzin on Foreign Banks and the Making of Modern China

This month's episode picks up on a theme previously explored on the podcast: international finance. Drawing on a broad range of German, English, Japanese, and Chinese sources, Ghassan Moazzin traces ...

3 Loka 202233min

Claire Dunning on Nonprofit Neighborhoods and Urban Inequality

Claire Dunning on Nonprofit Neighborhoods and Urban Inequality

In this month's episode, Claire Dunning explains how and why non-profits came to play such an important role in U.S. cities after World War II. In doing so, she explores the emergence of non-profit ne...

2 Elo 202249min

Mircea Raianu on Tata and Global Capitalism in India

Mircea Raianu on Tata and Global Capitalism in India

In this episode, Mircea Raianu traces the rise of the Tata Group, one of India's largest and oldest companies, from its early days involved in cotton and opium trading to multinational conglomerate in...

7 Heinä 202249min

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