The collection is organised around three thematic issues that pose significant challenges to workers' safety and health in the United States. First, the economy has shifted from an industrial base to a white collar/service base which includes more women workers than ever before - yet many of the safety and health problems that affect women are not being adequately addressed. Second, free market ideology and globalization have served to undermine worker safety and health laws. And finally, the effects of 9/11 have exacerbated the trend toward weakening workers' rights and safety standards in the name of national security.
 
Includes: Criminal neglect: how dangerous employers stay safe from prosecution; Regulating risk at work: is expert paternalism the answer to workers irrationality?; Silicosis and the on-going struggle to protect workers’ health; How safe are U.S. workplaces for Spanish-speaking workers?; Got air? - The campaign to improve indoor air quality at the City University of New York; State or society? The rise and repeal of OSHA's ergonomics standard; The ten-percenters: gender, nationality, and occupational health in Canada; All that's solid melts into air : worker participation in Ontario, 1970-2000; The sinking of the neoliberal P-36 platform in Brazil; and Health and safety at work in Russia and Hungary.