Hired: Six Months Undercover In Low-Wage Britain

Description: A The Times best current affairs and big ideas Book of the Year, 2018 Zero-hours contracts and the gig economy have redefined the relationship between companies and their workers: for many, careers are low-paid and high-risk, a series of short-term jobs with no security and little future. In this essential expose, James Bloodworth goes undercover to investigate how working life has become a waking nightmare. From the Orwellian reach of an Amazon warehouse and the high-turnover rate of a telesales factory in Wales to the time trials of a council care worker and the grim reality behind the glossy Uber App, Hired is a clear-eyed analysis of a divided nation and a riveting dispatch from the very frontline of low- age Britain. 'An extraordinary and unsettling journey into the way modern Britons work. It is George Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London for the gig-economy age' MATTHEW D'ANCONA, author of Post-Truth

Review: James Bloodworth's unflinching account of life and work in the towns we have come to know as being "left behind" exposes the mercilessness of the low-wage economy and modern capitalism * Prospect * Hired is a refreshing antidote to the fashionable post-work theses written from steel-and-ivory towers * The Big Questions (BBC TV) * James Bloodworth pulls back the carpet and exposes the rotten floorboards of Britain's low wage, insecure and exploitative economy, describing living and working conditions that Dickens would recognise. A wake-up call to our political elites to genuinely tackle the gross inequality at the heart of our society. * Wes Streeting, MP * A truly devastating examination of the vulnerable human underbelly of Britain's labour market, shining a bright light on the unjust and exploitative practices that erode the morale and living standards of working-class communities. * Frank Field, MP * I emerged from James Bloodworth's quietly devastating and deeply disturbing book convinced that the 'gig economy' is simply another way in which the powerful are enabled to oppress the disadvantaged * D. J. Taylor, author of Orwell: The Biography * Whatever you think of the political assertions in this book - and I disagree with many of them - this is an important investigation into the reality of low-wage Britain. Whether you are on the Right, Left or Centre, anybody who believes in solidarity and social justice should read this book. * Nick Timothy, former Chief of Staff to Theresa May * A wake-up call to us all. A very graphic and authentic journey exposing the hard and miserable working life faced by too many people living in Britain today. * Margaret Hodge, MP, former Chair, Public Accounts Committee * Unflinching... a refreshing antidote to the fashionable post-work theses written from steel-and-ivory towers. * Prospect * Exceptional... Bloodworth is the best young left wing writer Britain has produced in years. * Observer * An extraordinary and unsettling journey into the way modern Britons work. It is Down and Out In Paris and London for the gig economy age. * Matthew d'Ancona, Guardian columnist and bestselling author of Post-Truth * Grim but necessary reading... Theresa May should horrify [Bloodworth] by picking up a copy of Hired and learning from it. * Spectator * A very discomforting book, no matter what your politics might be... very good * Sunday Times * Potent, disturbing and revelatory... [Bloodworth] sets out to see something we should know more about than we do, and he tells the story of what he found well. * Evening Standard *

Author Biography: James Bloodworth is the former editor of Left Foot Forward, the influential political website. He is a fortnightly columnist for the International Business Times and regularly contributes to the Independent, Guardian, New Statesman and Wall Street Journal.