One day in August 2007, Daniel Coleman, an administrator in the Maryland court system, decided he should stay home to recover from an illness, as his doctor had ordered. But the day after he requested time off, he suddenly had more to worry about than his health; he was unemployed, too.

As the economy fails to improve, as we chart the rise of the Tea Party and the Republican Party’s ability to express disdain for unemployment benefits without significant political cost, Americans lack a roadmap for the role of class and gender in the new American landscape. Joan Williams’ book, Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter (Harvard 2010), supplies that roadmap. The book creates an innovative framework for examining the relationship between law, work and family in the post-industrial economy.

Lynn Gobbell was fired because her boss didn’t like the John Kerry bumper sticker on her car.

In Colorado, teacher Meg Spohn got the pink slip from DeVry University for complaining about her job on her personal blog.

At Best Lock Company in Indiana, workers are axed for social drinking because the company president believes it’s a sin.
Can Employers do that?

You betcha, writes human rights attorney Lewis Maltby. He’s president and founder of the National Workrights Institute, which he formed after leading the American Civil Liberties Union office on free speech and privacy protection in the corporate world.

Before heading up the Workrights Institute, Maltby had spent time in the corporate world where “learning how to run a productive, profitable company without violating employees’ human rights” became the focus of his life. Right up front in “Can They Do That,” Maltby gets to the crux of the misconception most people have when facing unfair treatment on the job.