There is probably no course in the curriculum that can have more direct relevance to life than inquiry in the sociology of work. Everybody works and work is a critical part of everybody's everyday life, affecting not only time spent working but time not working: in the household and in other spheres of private and public life, including leisure and opportunities for realizing or other goals in life.

We consider the role and meaning of work in life, beginning with classic considerations from The Book of Genesis, Aristotle, Marx and Max Weber. What is work? Is work a burden? Must it be? Do we work in order to have leisure? In order to have material goods? In order to improve the life chances of our children? To get out of the house?

We turn then to an overview of the differences in work wrought by capitalism, concentrating on the recent past. Consideration of the "economics" of capitalism is unavoidable; hence we offer a sketch of neo-classical ("mainstream") theory and of the Marxist understanding of capitalist reproduction.

We then examine  labor markets: What is the current structure? Students are required to seek data from the Bureau of Labor and the US Census which details current occupational and income distributions, employment and unemployment.  What matters in determining jobs and who gets to do what? What explains wage-rates and what are the many ways that Government affects outcomes? How does gender, class and race enter in the structuring of outcomes? How does immigration and other globalization process effect work and workers? Finally, how can individuals--or groups of individuals, affect change?

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