المستغلون: ازدراء أمريكا للطبقة الدنيا

In this controversial book (New York Times Book Review), New York Magazine senior writer Sarah Jones mixes personal stories with in-depth reporting to expose the harsh reality of America's culture of inequality and the devastating impact of the pandemic on society's most vulnerable. Like Matthew Desmond's The Displaced and Andrea Elliott's The Invisible Child, The Exploited is a poignant exploration of America's underclass, left vulnerable by systemic racism and capitalism. Here, Sarah Jones delves into the lives of essential workers, older people, and people with disabilities, who have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, not because of their age or occupation, but because of the systemic inequality and poverty that make them vulnerable to exploitation. The pandemic has been a stark revelation of the truth about America, a country where the dream of prosperity has become an unattainable mirage for millions of people. Jones argues that the pandemic did not create these dynamics, but rather exposed the existing problems of social mobility and wealth gap that have long plagued the country. Behind the horrific death toll lie stories of lives lost, injustices suffered by its people, and institutions that failed to protect their citizens. Jones highlights these stories, transforming the abstract concept of a pandemic into a deeply personal and political phenomenon. Her book “reminds us of the lessons our country has willfully ignored—one that is particularly stark as Donald Trump returns to the White House and continues to shred the social safety net” (The Washington Post).