Making Precarity Work: Life on the Edge of Venice Beach

Shows how the precarious workers of Venice Beach—without help from the government—work together to create a safety net for themselves.

In Making Precarity Work, sociologist Laura A. Orrico shows how Los Angeles’s Venice Beach boardwalk, which is a magnet for tourists, is also a workplace, one that wouldn’t exist without the motley crew of people selling art, drinking, performing, using drugs, and working odd jobs who gather daily to engage in varied activities, from selling crafts to mindi...