Hannah
I was not familiar with the name Frances Perkins when I started this audiobook, but found myself falling in love with this piece of historical fiction. It digs into the very real accomplishments of the first female member of a presidential cabinet. Perkins was the longest serving Secretary of Labor, an architect of the 40-hour work week and Social Security, a drafter of child labor bans, and an advocate for aiding Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany. The novel dips into fictions to imagine Perkin's personal life - what she must've been thinking while battling through a majority male government to fight for working class rights.
I finished this book with immense respect for Frances Perkins, and for FDR, who broke gender conventions by empowering her to fundamentally change our country.
'Why economics?', I echoed gamely. 'Because many people in American believe poverty is a moral problem having to do with sloth or some other sin we can blame on individuals. But I believe poverty in America is an economic problem that can be solved...and I intend to solve it.'
Social security - which was expanded again and again to cover more Americans of every race and creed - is now so much a part of American psychology that I truly believe no politician, political party, or political group can possibly destroy it and maintain a democratic system. I suppose I should also be grateful that the reforms I fought for are bricks so firmly embedded in the edifice of national life that Americans now take them for granted.
I was not familiar with the name Frances Perkins when I started this audiobook, but found myself falling in love with this piece of historical fiction. It digs into the very real accomplishments of the first female member of a presidential cabinet. Perkins was the longest serving Secretary of Labor, an architect of the 40-hour work week and Social Security, a drafter of child labor bans, and an advocate for aiding Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany. The novel dips into fictions to imagine Perkin's personal life - what she must've been thinking while battling through a majority male government to fight for working class rights.
I finished this book with immense respect for Frances Perkins, and for FDR, who broke gender conventions by empowering her to fundamentally change our country.
'Why economics?', I echoed gamely. 'Because many people in American believe poverty is a moral problem having to do with sloth or some other sin we can blame on individuals. But I believe poverty in America is an economic problem that can be solved...and I intend to solve it.'
Social security - which was expanded again and again to cover more Americans of every race and creed - is now so much a part of American psychology that I truly believe no politician, political party, or political group can possibly destroy it and maintain a democratic system. I suppose I should also be grateful that the reforms I fought for are bricks so firmly embedded in the edifice of national life that Americans now take them for granted.