Labor Day Special: Retail Exodus; Prison Labor; Four-Day Week; Pandemic Start-Ups; plus, Electric Jazz at 50

On this Labor Day, enjoy these recent work-related conversations, plus Miles Davis' Bitches Brew at 50:

• Anna North, senior correspondent at Vox and author of the bestselling book Outlawed (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021), Nearly 650,000 workers in the retail sector quit their jobs in the month of April, the biggest number in over 20 years. AN joins to take calls from listeners on how this exodus is affecting their lives -- whether from the perspective of the workers or the shoppers.
• U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley (D OR) discusses his "Abolition Amendment" which would seek to close the "slavery loophole" in the 13th amendment, then Bianca Tylek, Worth Rises’s executive director, talks about programs that require incarcerated people to work for little or no pay.
• Anne Helen Petersen, culture writer and the co-author of the forthcoming book Out of Office: The Big Problem and Bigger Promise of Working From Home (Knopf, 2021), Iceland just released the results of a four year study of more than 2500 employees in different fields whose work weeks were reduced by one day. AHP talks about the study's findings and whether shortening schedules could work in the United States.
• Listeners share the businesses they've started over the past 18 months.
• Marcus Miller, musician, composer and record producer, talks about Miles Davis' classic album Bitches Brew, which was released in 1970 but won a Grammy in 1971, plus more from that year in music, including the birth of jazz-rock fusion, including groups like Weather Report and The Mahavishnu Orchestra.

These interviews were edited slightly for time, the original versions are available here:

The Retail Worker Exodus (Jun 25, 2021)

Closing the 13th Amendment Loophole (Mar 2, 2021)

The Case for the 4-Day Work Week (Jul 19, 2021)

Did You Start a Business During the Pandemic? (Aug 20, 2021)

Iconic at 50: Miles Davis' 'Bitches Brew' (Aug 12, 2021)