How Work Got So Bad
Under capitalism, technological "progress" like AI systematically deskills workers, deepens managerial control, and turns the labor process into a site of conflict rather than liberation. This is by design.
Why does every new technology seem to make work harder and not easier? In 1974, Harry Braverman published a seminal text, Labor and Monopoly Capital: The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century, to answer that question. Combining a careful study of scientific management and technological innovation with several of Karl Marx's key concepts, Braverman explained why workers under capitalism are gradually transformed into mere cogs in the machine.
In this episode of the Jacobin Radio podcast Confronting Capitalism, Vivek Chibber and Melissa Naschek discuss the process of managers breaking down workers' skills and why work under capitalism tends to degrade rather than fulfill us.
Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber is produced by Catalyst: A Journal of Theory and Strategy and published by Jacobin. You can listen to the full episode here. This transcript has been edited for clarity.