On the Clock with Emily Guendelsberger

One journalist took three low-wage jobs; one at Amazon, one at McDonalds, and another at a call center - to learn about work in modern America.

Air Date: July 16, 2019 10:00 am

Humberto Manzano, Jr., delivers an arriving pallet of goods at an Amazon.com fulfillment center in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, file)

Guest: Emily Guendelsberger

On her first day working at an Amazon warehouse, journalist EMILY GUENDELSBERGER was struck with how friendly everyone was. After three monotonous days of working 12-hour shifts, she felt like she’d “been hit like a garbage truck.” Guendelsberger took a job at McDonalds and a call center as well, to get an idea about the working conditions and income of the employees at some of America’s biggest companies. She wrote about her experience in her new book On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane. She joins Marty today to talk about what she saw, who she met, how she felt, and the lessons she learned from her years in the modern low-wage workforce.

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