WINNING THE WAR ON WAGES:

Those who held the old industrial jobs had a significant advantage over today's workers. They came together on the factory floor or worked together as they shifted cargo. But that kind of manufacturing has largely disappeared in the United States and other highly developed economies. Technological change makes the once bustling ports a site with no workers except the occasional engineer required to fix the machines and those invisibly on computers in offices directing the flow of cargo. The new industries tend to separate rather than congregate workers. Moreover, in the past, employees celebrated being working class. Today's employees tend to be outside class categories. They are often better educated, but even those with low skills seem more individualistic in their attitudes and more libertarian in their politics.

Today's workers are an increasingly complex category. Some sit together in large spaces and gather regularly in the lunch and meeting rooms. Think Google or Uber. Some work in teams to create a product. Think Apple or Microsoft. But many have little or no actual contact with each other. Think Uber drivers or the "Turkers'' of Amazon who browse online to find work a computer still can't do. Many of the new tech and transportation companies define a lot of their workers as independent contractors or temporary employees hired through an employment agency. The workers thus have few rights; there are limits on collective bargaining and even access to benefits provided to others doing comparable jobs. And when jobs reduce face-to-face interactions and interdependencies among the employees, trust and solidarity, the stuff of effective organizing, is harder to achieve.

The inability of workers to express voice has significant consequences for the nature of our societies. Political parties and elected officials are likely to be less and less responsive to workers who neither mobilize in labor organizations nor vote. We have already witnessed, in numerous sectors, a decline in occupational health and safety, health-care benefits, and social insurance. We are witnessing an increase in inequality and insecure employment. Employers now have more power over their workforce. While some may argue that this enables the companies to be more efficient and wealth enhancing, there is far more evidence that unconstrained employer power leads to job dissatisfaction, lowers productivity, and passes off to the society the costs of care of those who work multiple jobs or none at all.

Follow @brothersjudd