Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don't Talk about It)

Why our workplaces are authoritarian private governments-and why we can't see it



One in four American workers says their workplace is a "dictatorship." Yet that number almost certainly would be higher if we recognized employers for what they are-private governments with sweeping authoritarian power over our lives. Many employers minutely regulate workers' speech, clothing, and manners on the job, and employers often extend their authority to the off-duty lives of workers, who can be fired fo...