The Anxiety of Precarity: The United States in Comparative Perspective

This chapter explores the dynamics of precarity and socioeconomic risk across the most advanced industrial countries. We situate the United States in a comparative framework to identify the characteristics it shares with other rich democracies as well as the distinctive dynamics of precarity in the American context. The United States stands out for the way it combines uncommonly high levels of individual-level exposure to various risks with low levels of collectively provided insurance to mitigate the impact of these risks. Moreover, we show that the institutions of the American political economy operate to compound risk, actively promoting what we call risk contagion, as misfortune in one arena spreads to foment misfortune in others.