of course i am joe mccartin in case anybody has forgotten. today, we're going to be talking about a period from 1968 to 1988 that i call "turnabout" years. i come up with the title

of course i am joe mccartin in case anybody has forgotten. today, we're going to be talking about a period from 1968 to 1988 that i call "turnabout" years. i come up with the title because of a historian that wrote about the 1930's. he called them "the turbulent years." the years of militancy and organizing we saw. these years were equally important to shaping 20th century working america, but in a different way. they were not years of upheaval, organization, and progress, so much as a big turnabout. a way in which the working american class took a turn to a different stage in its existence. we could say that from the 1930's to the 1970's was an experience of unbroken promise and expanding rights for workers. in the years between 1968 and 1988, a lot of that turned around. so, "turnabout years." i want to start with three stories that help locate what is going on in this period, and talk about what's going on with the economy. talking about public-sector workers in the period, what they faced, and then conclude with some barometers of what's