From the Roaring Twenties through to the Great Depression, Irving Bernstein presents a comprehensive history of the American workforce. The Lean Years is the first instalment of Bernstein's critically acclaimed trilogy on the American labour movement which charts how the New Deal and labour unions preserved democracy and capitalism at a time when the survival of both was unclear. This classic text revolutionises social history, vividly narrating an era of wrenching hardships but also great victories in the workers' movement.