History's tapestry is so richly woven that one can choose any individual thread of the fabric and, in loyally following the length of its lead, become a tourist in the landscape of the past. Mark Hendrickson makes this type of journey and takes the reader along with him as a travelling companion in American Labor and Economic Citizenship. The scenery of his tapestry is the U.S. economy of the 1920s; the thread he follows is the effect of interwoven efforts by policy makers, labor leaders, researchers, philanthropists, and others to improve the lives of American workers in this decade. Shedding light on various efforts to understand and address the difficulties faced by members of the labor force, Hendrickson introduces us to figures who braid their way into the nubby texture of the 1920s, such as Mary van Kleeck, George E. Haynes, and Paul Douglas. Page by page, we run our hands over a tapestry of capitalism's New Era in which citizens who were dissatisfied with economic outcomes sought progress. Among Hendrickson's valuable contributions is his showcasing of ways in which individual endeavors within different political and economic sectors successfully complemented one another without overt coordination from federal oversight. His detailed, seamless narrative provides a memorable illustration of the term “economic citizenship”.

The decade of the 1920s was characterized by economic and social changes within a growing awareness that interests of capital and labor were not necessarily at odds with one another. In these years, as Hendrickson writes, “economic stability, increasing real wages, and relative labor peace led labor experts from business, organized labor, academia, and nonprofits to converge around a new model that replaced conflict with an emphasis on consumption and growth as the key to widely shared prosperity, economic stability, and labor peace” (p. 36). If capitalism is fueled by wage incomes, the goal of economic affluence cannot be reached through a route of wage suppression. Recognition of this fact then prompts a question: What is the path to widely-shared affluence? Hendrickson documents the attempts to find and implement answers during this pivotal decade.

In addition to concerns they may have had about income inequality, policy makers and business leaders began to pay attention to the connection between wages and consumer spending. Even before circular-flow diagrams became commonplace in introductory economics texts, this concept of the worker's dual role as producer and consumer was a notable influence on the thinking of the 1920s. Alongside this were questions about working hours. Could a workday that was too long for workers perhaps fail the best interests of employers as well?

Hendrickson chooses his details carefully, never straying far from the unifying thread of his passage through the tapestry on display. Examples serve to illustrate his thesis and also to embroider the story with more interest. One of his well-presented, recurring themes is the emerging role of research and data collection in evaluating the living conditions of American workers. Following the lead established by Carroll D. Wright in the 1890s, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics continued to measure wages, working hours, and prices of consumer goods. Coming from a slightly different perspective, the Women's Bureau (established by Congress in 1920) also measured earnings and hours of women in the workforce, then presented these findings in the context of the reality that women were commonly long-term labor force participants making significant contributions to household income. But activities of data gathering extended beyond the government sector. The American Federation of Labor Research Bureau and the Labor Bureau Inc. compiled statistical profiles of the labor landscape in the 1920s as well.

In his comprehensive overview of the decade, Hendrickson also directs our attention to the status of African American workers, Mexican immigrants, and Mexican Americans in the labor force. Several themes of his narrative converge in these two final chapters. We visit extensive social changes brought about by the Great Migration, the ongoing struggle against racist stereotypes, and the economic impact of an expanding workforce. As the length of the industrial work day declined to eight hours, Bethlehem Steel and U.S. Steel employed African Americans and workers coming from Mexico for the newly-created third shift. But the 1920s certainly were not free of racial conflict, and research once again played a key role in defining ways to improve the lives of all within a diverse citizenry contributing to growth and prosperity in the United States.

As a depiction of economic conditions in the New Era, American Labor and Economic Citizenship has its limits. But these limits are not shortcomings of the book. Rather, they are the result of Hendrickson's devotion to the thread he has chosen to follow. His attention focuses on individuals who endeavored to bring about wisely beneficial and effective change for American workers. Some readers may wish to delve further into the relationship between macroeconomic policy and income distribution in the 1920s or into the implications of wages determined by worker needs, rather than by productivity. These readers may turn to complementary work such as contributed by Patrick D. Reagan (Designing a New America: the Origins of New Deal Planning. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999) or Lawrence B. Glickman (A Living Wage: American Workers and the Making of Consumer Society. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1997).

History does more than tell us about the past. When it is written with thoughtfulness, intelligence, and insight, history also reveals what it means to be human. American Labor and Economic Citizenship does this. Nearly a century has passed since the events described in Hendrickson's book, and yet similar concerns dominate today's conversations about social justice. Does employment-based discrimination prevent some workers from contributing their potential value? What can, or should, be done to alleviate income inequality? Are economic opportunity and upward mobility equally available to all? Those who feel discouraged by the weightiness of these contemporary issues may find in Hendrickson's book a sense of promise that solutions can be found, and that any individual may be the one who provides valuable answers to pleading questions asked by those who struggle homeward at day's end, weary from their work.