Step 2

Who cares what I have to say about a relatively obscure music form and how it does or doesn't share common value with a hidebound movement on its last legs?

Well, the first part of that answer is that America needs a labor movement. There is not a free, first world country on the planet that does not also have a free, vibrant, and independent trade union movement (in many countries where state repression is the norm, trade unions are appendages of the state). Here in America, the labor movement is separate from the state. At times it has colluded with it, like during the Cold War when unions within the AFL-CIO played a significant role in suppressing left-leaning workers' movements in the third world. Still, at home, American unions and the state often have separate interests. The time when 1 out 3 Americans belonged to labor unions represents the time when prosperity in this country was its most equally divided among the classes.With union membership at its lowest since the turn of the 20th century, American inequality is surging. The two facts are connected, if not causally, then at least with statistical significance:

 

Until finally, we get to this: