Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy

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A stirring, comprehensive look at the state of women in the workforcewhy womens 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 representationwomen on the board of Fortune 500 companies and our first female vice presidentwomen have limited recourse when they experience harassment and discrimination.

Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy explains that the system that governs our economya winner-take-all economyis 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 dont compete on the same terms as men, they lose; if women do compete on the same terms as men, theyre punished more harshly for their sharp elbows or actual misdeeds; and when women see that they cant win on the same terms as men, they take themselves out of the game (if they havent been pushed out already). With odds like these stacked against them, its no wonder women feel like, no matter how hard they work, they cant get ahead.

Fair Shake is not a fix the woman book; its 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.

Reviews

"Fair Shakewill rattle your understanding of gender discrimination in the workplace. Smooth writing and smartly marshaled facts expose the triple bind that hobbles all women workers. If you believe, as I did, that the gender pay gap has been narrowing, you will learn that that's only because the wages of poorly educated men declined.The authors, law professors with more than a century of experience examining gender issues, show how Sam Walton, Jack Welch, and other business titans created subtle unwritten rules that exploit labor law loopholes, ensuring that men enjoy more pay and more promotions than women, the very definition of unfairness."
David Cay Johnston, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter and bestselling author

Fair Shakeexpertly defines and explains the corporate system I was so engrained in, and how its designed to hold women back. Naming and analyzing the structural problems in our workplaces today is the first step to improving them. This is a must-read for any working women today; I felt seen and heard and less alone in my experiences in Corporate America.
Jamie Fiore Higgins, author ofBully Market

By sifting through legal cases of the past twenty-five years, Cahn, Carbone, and Levit have illuminated how extreme power concentration continues to hold women back in our economy. Its a rousing indictment of a noxious winner-take-all system and an encouragement that collective action can create a more equitable economy, one which dignifies the work of the many and shares power for the betterment of all.
Julie Battilana and Tiziana Casciaro, authors ofPower, For All

Robust evidence for the need for systemic change.
Kirkus Reviews

Fair Shake answers the enduringand perplexingquestion: why are women struggling to advance in the American workplace Authors Cahn, Carbone, and Levit have provided a set of three clear and undeniable answers. Rigorous, insightful, and ultimately hopeful, this is a must-read for every person who wants women to succeed.
Linda Babcock,professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University and bestselling author ofThe No ClubandWomen Don't Ask

"This is expert legal story-telling at its best. Cahn, Carbone, and Levit brilliantly unpack how the winner takes all aspects of business undermines any real hope of women achieving equality.Fair Shakeburns at the soul as it reveals case after case of women being cheated in the workplace and too often denied justice inAmerican courts. This is a must readI could not put the book down."
Michele Bratcher Goodwin, Linda D. & Timothy J. ONeill Professorof Constitutional Law and Global Health Policy, Georgetown Law School

Author Bio

Naomi Cahn, June Carbone, and Nancy Levit are law professors and mothers and have served in leadership roles at various institutions and with national organizations. They research and write in the areas of employment discrimination, family law, and gender theory. They have written both popular books and law school casebooks, including: Red Families v. Blue Families, Marriage Markets, and The Gender Line.