“Moneybags for Billionaires, Body Bags for Workers: Organizing” in the Time of the Pandemic by Sheri Davis and Marilyn Sneiderman
In 2020, the coronavirus and the murder of George Floyd at the hands of the police revealed the extent to which people of color and the entire working class is confronting the economic injustice and racism of a political system stacked in favor of elites. The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the degree to which late capitalism is broken, from the failure of supply chains to manufacture and distribute personal protective equipment (PPE), to a health care system unable to address a pandemic, to state unemployment systems that are incapable of processing millions of new employment claims. Rampant state violence and the unabated harms inflicted on communities of color by highly militarized, unionized police forces nationwide revealed the depths of structural racism. These conditions amplified demands by progressive educators, racial justice and community organizations for #PoliceFreeSchools, and calls to “Defund the Police.” Labor’s response and lack of response to these twin pandemics demonstrate both the weakened state of the labor movement, and the urgency for its revival. And the successes and failures of organized labor to confront these challenges offer some clues as to what labor must do now.