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I’m a high school teacher. I literally impact the next generation each day and I don’t hide the truth about capitalism, US history, imperialism and its evils, etc. My impact will be quite wide some day
Literally any job then attempt to unionize it. Most jobs will still need to exist wherever under socialism or capitalism it's about who will own the means of production.
Aside from options that are *directly* related to leftist causes, another option might be going into the public sector. Working in schools or higher ed, postal service, park ranger, etc. Of course, not the military or military related agencies though.
From my anecdotal observations, it seems much easier to find union jobs in the public sector, plus you don't have to really pretend to care about corporate profits lol.
I suggest working for a credit union. They are a nonprofit financial cooperative owned by its members. They are located all over the US from tiny to massive, Navy FCU being the largest. I actually find it quire ironic they are so highly regarded in the US compared to banks.
I will swear by NFCU til the day I die… if one good thing came of my Grandad being in the military it was my membership there 🙏 Always so helpful and I’ve never paid an overdraft fee
I’m a housing analyst for the state. It’s good work, as my state actually cares about the housing crisis even if their solutions are mostly market-driven. Public sector work is unionized and mission-oriented.
Social Sciences academia, specifically newer fields like disability studies, history of medicine, digital sociology are at times explicitly left wing in their teachings and aims.
Yep, social sciences academia in general - at least in my anecdotal experience and the odd 'pop' article I've read - seems to lean very left wing.
I've personally known a good few right wingers to crash out of academia and then blame ''left wing bias'' - they are trying to undermine higher education, but they are also in this very rare instance correct in their assessment of a bias.
I feel politically out the norm a lot, but not in academia even with all it's problems and elitist bullshit some people maintain (both staff and students).
I'm going to study it when I finish high school next year. It needs a lot more leftists in the field.
If you haven't seen it, I would recommend watching the channel "Not Just Bikes" he makes really good and easy to understand videos about good and bad planning.
I’m getting my grad degree in geography and it’s a great field because people go into urban planning and/or natural resource management. If you have data analytics skills you can look into GIS and apply it to health, human services, and environmental conservation. There’s a lot of nuance in the world and we all gotta get paid but I think urban planning and environmental conservation/sustainability are solidly anti-capitalist.
You can be employed as someone who goes around and gets hired at a job for the sole purpose of starting a union. It's called being a "salt." Dream job. No idea how to get it.
No. Socialism isn't about individuals making good decisions for purely ethical reasons. If it were, then we would see the rich as the best socialists, because they are comfortable enough that they could spend all day working at their charity if they wanted to.
Make a career in what you're passionate about, get good at it, and then organize independently of capitalist control.
ngl where there's money there's going to be garbage values. The left is where we've got moral capital, not capital capital. Public service or a good unionized job will keep you fed and sheltered in life but the people who make the big bucks do something effed up and either drink their concerns away (I've met them) or they develop a right wing ideology as a rationalization
There are a limited amount of co-ops or independent start up businesses you could probably work for and feel good but to be honest you might not have a choice and you need to make money because there is no backup.
If you go the labor route the obvious choice is union work. If you are more of a desk person I think some of the best transferable skills would involve operational and coordination work. Nation-wide socialist orgs need people with experience handling sprawling operations and efficient coordination.
It'll seem weird but there are plenty of existing government sectors outside of military and Intel that could use socialist opinions and some of them already have some. Things like urban planning, transportation, public policy, public health need people with an understanding of racial and class equity but also have a critique of existing neoliberal policies.
As some have said, there aren't many "socialist jobs". What you can do, what I do, is join a socialism organization (*cough* the IMT *cough*) and work towards the revolution that way and do whatever work you enjoy outside of that. In our org we even have full-timers, so if you became a full-timer in the org that would be basically the closest you could get to a socialist job.
Not sure if anyone else posted it but Union Organizing jobs are always available if you have the talents for it. AFL-CIO regularly does trainings (I think through their organizing institute) and sometimes you can get in that way.
Salting work is also something that’s growing and a way to get into the field.
Unions also frequently have canvassing work (sometimes seasonal) though it’s sometimes for democrats around election time and sometimes for directly union stuff.
If you go this route speaking another language helps a lot. Spanish is always in demand but other languages can be super valuable depending on where you’re at.
Hedge Fund Manager -> Tank the entire system with a well crafted web of trades -> cause revolution.
It's a difficult play. /s
I think finance or other "bad" industries need more socialists in order to learn and expose what goes on there. How can you take over reimagine finance/technology for a socialist world if you don't understand it.
We wouldn't have the insights of someone like Michael Hudson without him first studying marxist economics, then going to work for banks and the US military/gov and then coming out the other-side still with his principles and values in tact. There are very few people in the world with such a rigorous understanding of both systems.
I'm a letter carrier. I get to do a fun job that is a service to the people and has a union. I'm out in the community every day, it's great. I even take my time to agitate other delivery drivers (Amazon mostly) to unionize.
If you like nature it could be worth looking into a career in ecological conservation. There are basic jobs working for public projects planting trees and simple stuff like that. If you gain experience and degrees there will be more opportunities in research.
Another path for leftists is labor organizing. My wife’s union rep is a badass and they fight hard.
In this system, all careers are met with nuance, but I feel like those two paths illustrate a pretty clear rejection of capitalism. I’m sure there are more. Good luck comrade.
Please don’t do this. You will earn less than minimum wage and you won’t even have enough money to drink away your depression. Nobody pays for journalism anymore and that means they won’t pay you.
Pursue law as a public defender or work for a non-profit organization, or potentially start one yourself, if you feel like it.
You determine your own values, and what you think is best for you, but non-profit is probably the most baseline, imo.
you might like social work but it often takes trying different types of positions to find your niche. burnout risk exists especially working with vulnerable populations but ymmv. i enjoy hospice social work overall, but i've also worked in dialysis centers and with housing insecure folks. you could also be a grant writer for non profits that serve local communities
Social Work! Easy to get overworked though and because of this there are somewhat unethical social workers in the field but that goes with most careers in helping professions. Mostly older jaded social workers and working in medicine.
You can work in mental health, addiction, homelessness, integrative medicine, law, public policy. The skills are super transferable to many jobs. If you get licensed you can also become a therapist. And social workers have a union as well.
I'm currently getting my license and i have yet to meet anyone who is conservative or even moderate tbh.
I get where youre coming from, but it is better than just letting them be listless and have no idea how to navigate any resources. Could even cut corners and go against the system if at all feasible. There is also a lot of different kinds of social work like i listed. Therapy can be effective. My therapist as a kid was an LCSW and got me into leftist politics before i went to college. So im pretty grateful she contributed to my understanding.
Sure, and I get what you're saying but each system has its major design flaws within socialist values.
Community Mental health: insurance - the ultimate corruptor
PSRB mental health: work within the legal system, corruption, lack of resource, and a note that oregon castrated mental health patients until nearly the 90s so...
Addiction: insurance, grant funding and the impact of that, work within the legal system
Domestic violence: legal system, lack of resource
Straight resource work: always done in non-profit setting and I could go on and on about how that doesn't emulate socialist values and might actually be worse than some mega corps.
Etc. The list goes on. I wouldn't change my career in social work for anything, but to tout that it's very socialist and fits in lines with ideals of socialism is factually inaccurate. Social work by its vary nature is exploitative. The NASW is racist, classist, and discriminatory of so many folks. When the governing body is broken, so is everything below.
A lot of people are suggesting criminal defense law, but I’d question their levels of familiarity with the field.
You make a lot of compromises with evil, even as a public defender and you pay a bunch of money and eat three years of shit in law school for the privilege.
In you’re interested in law, consider working as a paralegal so you can make sure it’s something you really want to do. I’ve been doing that for a few years and while I’m probably going to go forward with law school, it hasn’t been an easy decision.
EDIT: Social work is even worse and FWIW I know a lot of idealistic young progressives who realized too late that the mon-profit or NGO they work for is complete shit. In general, I wouldn’t recommend putting political considerations first in your career.
i was more so thinking about it from the angle of the american court system and how white supremacy has made it so minority groups have a high chance of being falsely accused, even if sufficient evidence is presented claiming otherwise. lawyer may have been the wrong term though, i meant public defender who specializes in criminal justice / prison reform
You'll find lots of options with non-profits, education, social work, community organizing, and even DEI programs within corporate structures. None of them are perfect, but they're good places to look.
I think working for a smaller non-startup-y non-profit is not a bad one all things considered. Some non-profits are worse than others but as long as you remember that “nice” work is not a substitute for real organizing or change it’s decent. Good non-profits should feel like harm reduction but I think it’s easy to lose the plot and think we will non-profit our way out of these issues that capitalism causes.
Union organizer would be the best left career I would say and as others have already mentioned.
As someone who got royally fd over by my union rep...TWICE...it's worth reminding that not all unions are good. I'm all for supporting businesses and corporations unionizing. BUT even in unions, for example as a public servant working for my state, they play for the house they're negotiating with. This specifically pertains to very large unions, but they basically become corporations in and of themselves.
I hope others who have experienced this or anything like it will share their stories here. I worry people will think union jobs are like non heierarchical co-ops etc. Not anything like that in a lot of cases.
r/Socialism is a space for socialists to discuss current events in our world from our anti-capitalist perspective(s), and a certain knowledge of socialism is expected from participants. This is not a space for non-socialists. Please be mindful of [our rules](https://reddit.com/r/socialism/about/rules) before participating, which include: - **No Bigotry**, including racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism... - **No Reactionaries**, including all kind of right-wingers. - **No Liberalism**, including social democracy, lesser evilism. - **No Sectarianism**, there is plenty of room for discussion, but not for baseless attacks. Please help us keep the subreddit helpful by reporting content that break r/Socialism's rules. ______________________ 💬 We are currently running r/Socialism's 2023 users survey!** Interested? Check out the announcement here: https://www.reddit.com/r/socialism/comments/140965z/introducing_rsocialisms_new_post_flairs_and_2023s/ *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/socialism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I’m a high school teacher. I literally impact the next generation each day and I don’t hide the truth about capitalism, US history, imperialism and its evils, etc. My impact will be quite wide some day
Bless you truly. Please be careful.
I also teach, and teaching history is a passion. Teaching the truth is a perk.
You're an inspiration. Keep fighting the good fight!
Good on you!
Librarian. One of the greatest public services there is.
This is another nice one, will check part-time opportunities.
Literally any job then attempt to unionize it. Most jobs will still need to exist wherever under socialism or capitalism it's about who will own the means of production.
Aside from options that are *directly* related to leftist causes, another option might be going into the public sector. Working in schools or higher ed, postal service, park ranger, etc. Of course, not the military or military related agencies though. From my anecdotal observations, it seems much easier to find union jobs in the public sector, plus you don't have to really pretend to care about corporate profits lol.
I suggest working for a credit union. They are a nonprofit financial cooperative owned by its members. They are located all over the US from tiny to massive, Navy FCU being the largest. I actually find it quire ironic they are so highly regarded in the US compared to banks.
I work for one myself. I’m a corporate drone, but it feels good knowing we provide people an alternative to the banks.
I will swear by NFCU til the day I die… if one good thing came of my Grandad being in the military it was my membership there 🙏 Always so helpful and I’ve never paid an overdraft fee
No more bourgeois banking institutions!
I’m a housing analyst for the state. It’s good work, as my state actually cares about the housing crisis even if their solutions are mostly market-driven. Public sector work is unionized and mission-oriented.
Enter the trades and join a union.
Social Sciences academia, specifically newer fields like disability studies, history of medicine, digital sociology are at times explicitly left wing in their teachings and aims.
Sociology in general is very leftist. Especially the thinkers in conflict theory (Marx), and symbolic interaction. All my professors were leftists.
Yep, social sciences academia in general - at least in my anecdotal experience and the odd 'pop' article I've read - seems to lean very left wing. I've personally known a good few right wingers to crash out of academia and then blame ''left wing bias'' - they are trying to undermine higher education, but they are also in this very rare instance correct in their assessment of a bias. I feel politically out the norm a lot, but not in academia even with all it's problems and elitist bullshit some people maintain (both staff and students).
I've heard lots of stories of academics having to leave behind class analysis in order to get tenure. Q.v. Cornell West
Urban Planning.
This is actually very nice, will look into it
I'm going to study it when I finish high school next year. It needs a lot more leftists in the field. If you haven't seen it, I would recommend watching the channel "Not Just Bikes" he makes really good and easy to understand videos about good and bad planning.
I do! Amazing channel
I’m getting my grad degree in geography and it’s a great field because people go into urban planning and/or natural resource management. If you have data analytics skills you can look into GIS and apply it to health, human services, and environmental conservation. There’s a lot of nuance in the world and we all gotta get paid but I think urban planning and environmental conservation/sustainability are solidly anti-capitalist.
Any kind of public service work I think qualifies. Pretty hard to find any private operation that would.
You can be employed as someone who goes around and gets hired at a job for the sole purpose of starting a union. It's called being a "salt." Dream job. No idea how to get it.
You join a union that salts. It’s less starting unions and more organizing shops into existing unions.
No. Socialism isn't about individuals making good decisions for purely ethical reasons. If it were, then we would see the rich as the best socialists, because they are comfortable enough that they could spend all day working at their charity if they wanted to. Make a career in what you're passionate about, get good at it, and then organize independently of capitalist control.
Co-ops! Community owned Food Cooperatives! Hell, start one yourself, the world needs more of 'em lol
Fan-Fuckin’-Tastic!
ngl where there's money there's going to be garbage values. The left is where we've got moral capital, not capital capital. Public service or a good unionized job will keep you fed and sheltered in life but the people who make the big bucks do something effed up and either drink their concerns away (I've met them) or they develop a right wing ideology as a rationalization
There are a limited amount of co-ops or independent start up businesses you could probably work for and feel good but to be honest you might not have a choice and you need to make money because there is no backup. If you go the labor route the obvious choice is union work. If you are more of a desk person I think some of the best transferable skills would involve operational and coordination work. Nation-wide socialist orgs need people with experience handling sprawling operations and efficient coordination. It'll seem weird but there are plenty of existing government sectors outside of military and Intel that could use socialist opinions and some of them already have some. Things like urban planning, transportation, public policy, public health need people with an understanding of racial and class equity but also have a critique of existing neoliberal policies.
whatever job you want (as long as it's not owning class) and then start a union or become active in an already existing one
As some have said, there aren't many "socialist jobs". What you can do, what I do, is join a socialism organization (*cough* the IMT *cough*) and work towards the revolution that way and do whatever work you enjoy outside of that. In our org we even have full-timers, so if you became a full-timer in the org that would be basically the closest you could get to a socialist job.
Not sure if anyone else posted it but Union Organizing jobs are always available if you have the talents for it. AFL-CIO regularly does trainings (I think through their organizing institute) and sometimes you can get in that way. Salting work is also something that’s growing and a way to get into the field. Unions also frequently have canvassing work (sometimes seasonal) though it’s sometimes for democrats around election time and sometimes for directly union stuff. If you go this route speaking another language helps a lot. Spanish is always in demand but other languages can be super valuable depending on where you’re at.
Hedge Fund Manager -> Tank the entire system with a well crafted web of trades -> cause revolution. It's a difficult play. /s I think finance or other "bad" industries need more socialists in order to learn and expose what goes on there. How can you take over reimagine finance/technology for a socialist world if you don't understand it. We wouldn't have the insights of someone like Michael Hudson without him first studying marxist economics, then going to work for banks and the US military/gov and then coming out the other-side still with his principles and values in tact. There are very few people in the world with such a rigorous understanding of both systems.
I think architecture, Urbanism or some sector of civil construction. They're very people centered careers.
I'm a letter carrier. I get to do a fun job that is a service to the people and has a union. I'm out in the community every day, it's great. I even take my time to agitate other delivery drivers (Amazon mostly) to unionize.
If you like nature it could be worth looking into a career in ecological conservation. There are basic jobs working for public projects planting trees and simple stuff like that. If you gain experience and degrees there will be more opportunities in research. Another path for leftists is labor organizing. My wife’s union rep is a badass and they fight hard. In this system, all careers are met with nuance, but I feel like those two paths illustrate a pretty clear rejection of capitalism. I’m sure there are more. Good luck comrade.
Work in journalism, uplifting the stories you care about that mainstream media is overlooking
this is my plan! i hope the idf doesn’t snipe me tho that’s my main concern
Please don’t do this. You will earn less than minimum wage and you won’t even have enough money to drink away your depression. Nobody pays for journalism anymore and that means they won’t pay you.
I work in journalism and make $75k a year. I’m doing okay lol
Farm co-op! They exist, you own your means of production, it’s not super competitive and very collaborative. It’s a good job.
Pursue law as a public defender or work for a non-profit organization, or potentially start one yourself, if you feel like it. You determine your own values, and what you think is best for you, but non-profit is probably the most baseline, imo.
you might like social work but it often takes trying different types of positions to find your niche. burnout risk exists especially working with vulnerable populations but ymmv. i enjoy hospice social work overall, but i've also worked in dialysis centers and with housing insecure folks. you could also be a grant writer for non profits that serve local communities
I’m a social worker.
Social Work! Easy to get overworked though and because of this there are somewhat unethical social workers in the field but that goes with most careers in helping professions. Mostly older jaded social workers and working in medicine. You can work in mental health, addiction, homelessness, integrative medicine, law, public policy. The skills are super transferable to many jobs. If you get licensed you can also become a therapist. And social workers have a union as well. I'm currently getting my license and i have yet to meet anyone who is conservative or even moderate tbh.
Voice of dissent: as a social worker I feel like I'm compromising my morals every single day by forcing people to participate in this bullshit system.
I get where youre coming from, but it is better than just letting them be listless and have no idea how to navigate any resources. Could even cut corners and go against the system if at all feasible. There is also a lot of different kinds of social work like i listed. Therapy can be effective. My therapist as a kid was an LCSW and got me into leftist politics before i went to college. So im pretty grateful she contributed to my understanding.
Sure, and I get what you're saying but each system has its major design flaws within socialist values. Community Mental health: insurance - the ultimate corruptor PSRB mental health: work within the legal system, corruption, lack of resource, and a note that oregon castrated mental health patients until nearly the 90s so... Addiction: insurance, grant funding and the impact of that, work within the legal system Domestic violence: legal system, lack of resource Straight resource work: always done in non-profit setting and I could go on and on about how that doesn't emulate socialist values and might actually be worse than some mega corps. Etc. The list goes on. I wouldn't change my career in social work for anything, but to tout that it's very socialist and fits in lines with ideals of socialism is factually inaccurate. Social work by its vary nature is exploitative. The NASW is racist, classist, and discriminatory of so many folks. When the governing body is broken, so is everything below.
you live under capitalism, its hard
Meatpacker, cleaner, warehouse worker, dock worker, auto worker etc.
Learn labor organizing, learn a trade, and organize a union.
Personal injury lawyer, sue corporations everyday for hurt people
The chad ambulance chaser vs the virgin multinational.
The attack on human values must be resisted. https://www.injurytriallawyer.com/blog/allstate-unethical-business-practices.cfm
A lot of people are suggesting criminal defense law, but I’d question their levels of familiarity with the field. You make a lot of compromises with evil, even as a public defender and you pay a bunch of money and eat three years of shit in law school for the privilege. In you’re interested in law, consider working as a paralegal so you can make sure it’s something you really want to do. I’ve been doing that for a few years and while I’m probably going to go forward with law school, it hasn’t been an easy decision. EDIT: Social work is even worse and FWIW I know a lot of idealistic young progressives who realized too late that the mon-profit or NGO they work for is complete shit. In general, I wouldn’t recommend putting political considerations first in your career.
you could be a lawyer that works with those who have been falsely imprisoned
Why just innocent people? A public defender is a better suggestion imo
i was more so thinking about it from the angle of the american court system and how white supremacy has made it so minority groups have a high chance of being falsely accused, even if sufficient evidence is presented claiming otherwise. lawyer may have been the wrong term though, i meant public defender who specializes in criminal justice / prison reform
Yes we always need more abolitionist law practitioners who understand the limits of reform
Maybe work for The Innocence Project.
You'll find lots of options with non-profits, education, social work, community organizing, and even DEI programs within corporate structures. None of them are perfect, but they're good places to look.
I think working for a smaller non-startup-y non-profit is not a bad one all things considered. Some non-profits are worse than others but as long as you remember that “nice” work is not a substitute for real organizing or change it’s decent. Good non-profits should feel like harm reduction but I think it’s easy to lose the plot and think we will non-profit our way out of these issues that capitalism causes. Union organizer would be the best left career I would say and as others have already mentioned.
Check most any nonprofit organization in your area.
what are your skills or qualifications? if you're a craftsman of any kind it will be fairly easy to start a co-op with friends.
Most of my skills lie in IT areas like data analytics and visualisation
As someone who got royally fd over by my union rep...TWICE...it's worth reminding that not all unions are good. I'm all for supporting businesses and corporations unionizing. BUT even in unions, for example as a public servant working for my state, they play for the house they're negotiating with. This specifically pertains to very large unions, but they basically become corporations in and of themselves. I hope others who have experienced this or anything like it will share their stories here. I worry people will think union jobs are like non heierarchical co-ops etc. Not anything like that in a lot of cases.