Precariat Quotes

Politicians seem desperate to appeal to their respective versions of the so called 'middle class,' unable to empathise with the precariat and eager to dream up fresh and tougher sanctions against society's wounded. (Guy Standing)
Although the precariat does not consist simply of victims, since many in it challenge their parents' labouring ethic, its growth has been accelerated by the neoliberalism of globalisation, which put faith in labour market flexibility, the commodification of everything, and the restructuring of social protection. View quote
Guy Standing
Think of how much time is spent looking and applying for jobs. Some of those who have read my book on the precariat have told me they have applied for thousands of jobs. This is scarcely leisure; it is work. View quote
Guy Standing
Many in the precariat know they have to spend considerable time just waiting for opportunities to arise. View quote
Guy Standing
In financial affairs and dealings with the state, those in the precariat are disadvantaged since they are usually less well-informed and have to do much more to satisfy demands made on them if they want to gain meagre state benefits. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat has been losing cultural rights in that those in it feel they cannot and do not belong to any community that gives them secure identity or a sense of solidarity and reciprocity, of mutual support. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat consists of a growing proportion of our total society. It is being habituated to accept a life of unstable labour and unstable living. Often they're unable to say what their occupation is, because what they're doing now might be quite different from what they were doing three months ago. View quote
Guy Standing
People in the precariat find themselves in the situation where the level of their education and qualifications is almost always higher than the sort of labour that they're going to be able to obtain. View quote
Guy Standing
A multi-tier social protection system must be based on a modest basic income so as to enable the precariat to build lives involving a balance of different types of work, not just labour in jobs. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat is the first class in history to be losing acquired rights - cultural, civil, social, economic, and political. View quote
Guy Standing
People in the precariat rely very heavily on money wages. (Guy Standing)
Retraining for the precariat is stressful and demoralising; often, they learn new tricks only to find them obsolescent or unwanted. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat can be divided into three further groups - atavists, who look back to a lost past; nostalgics, who look forlornly for a present, a home; and progressives, who look for a lost future. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat is today's mass class, which is both dangerous, in rejecting old political party agendas, and transformative, in wanting to become strong enough to be able to abolish itself, to abolish the conditions of insecurity and inequality that define it. View quote
Guy Standing
The precariat faces chronic uncertainty about what to do, about what incomes to expect, about state benefits that might be their due, about their relationships, their homes, and about the occupations they can realistically expect. View quote
Guy Standing
Capital is taxed much less than labour; subsidies going to capital, the rich, and middle-income earners greatly exceed the benefits going to the precariat and underclass. View quote
Guy Standing
There is already a generation of European graduates who feel they have been robbed of the better future they were led to expect. They are members of a new class: the precariat. View quote
Timothy Garton Ash