ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the neoliberal world of labor where precarity and global competition have everybody hustling to get by. The hustle represents a new ideal of labor, one in which earlier ideas of labor rooted in class are replaced with neoliberal ideas of labor rooted in human capital and self-enterprise. As this chapter shows, when market competition is generalized across the social field, all dimensions of life become defined by private enterprise and the appreciation of human capital. More specifically, this chapter explores work hustles (hustles to get paid); care hustles (hustles to sustain and reproduce social life); and state hustles (forced hustles imposed by the neoliberal state, including welfare and debt, that capitalize on shared precarity and disposability). While everyone is hustling, the cultural politics—especially the gender and racial politics—of the hustle divide us.
