An account of labor market inequality in the craft beer industry

Christopher Elliott

Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, 2025, vol. 14, issue 2

Abstract: First paragraph: Handcrafted Careers by Eli Revelle Yano Wilson successfully describes the racialized, classed, and gendered dimensions of work in the craft beer industry. The book’s research question might be stated as: How does systemic inequality in the labor market manifest in the artisanal craft beer industry? Wilson proposes that artisanal jobs in this new econ­omy are much more idiosyncratic and entre­preneurial, and thus subject to more variation than the expected patterns shaped by structures of race, class and gender. While most research on artisanal markets suggests the opposite—that whiteness and gentrification shape access to these artisanal spaces—Wilson poses the possibility that maybe, in spite of this research, craft beer will be different. How­ever, he finds that privilege exerts its influence here as well. “Bearded white guys” enjoy access to ex­hib­it pure passion in the creative pathway, whereas women typically end up on the service path, and minority males are assigned hard labor roles, such as distribution and canning. And so: labor market inequality in the craft beer industry must be ad­dres­sed in terms of race, class, and gender and acknowl­edge that micro-level inter­actions repro­duce an in­visible system of power that shapes career choices. . . .

Keywords: Labor; and; Human; Capital (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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