Book review of J. L. Collins and V. Mayer (2010) Both Hands Tied: Welfare Reform and the Race to the Bottom of the Low-Wage Labor Market

Jane L Collins and Victoria Mayer's book, Both Hands Tied: Welfare Reform and the Race to the Bottom of the Low-Wage Labor Market provides a timely analysis on the state of contemporary welfare reform in the USA with a focus on the lives of 33 women in Milwaukee and Racine, Wisconsin, As the book notes, these areas were formerly manufacturing centres but in the recent years have experienced deindustrialization and an emergent service-based economy that continues to have quite dramatic effects on the lives of low-wage workers.