“What Feminism Owes the Working Class: Class Struggle as a Gender Issue”

Feminism Isn’t Truly Feminism Without Class Consciousness

Feminism has fought for voting rights, abortion access, and workplace equity.

But too often, it’s forgotten who it’s been fighting for.

Because when feminism centers white-collar voices only, it leaves behind millions of women who can’t afford to lean in—they’re too busy clocking in.

It’s time we say it clearly:

Class is a feminist issue.

And always has been.

The Feminist Movement Has Been Unequal From the Start

The suffragette movement secured the vote—for white women first.

Second-wave feminism focused on liberation from domesticity—for women who could afford to work outside the home.

Even “lean in” feminism assumes you have a desk job, a nanny, and a boardroom waiting.

What about the rest?

• The warehouse workers

• The janitors

• The waitresses

• The cashiers

• The caretakers

They are just as feminist.

And their struggles are just as political.

Who Is the Working Class?

Let’s define it plainly.

Working-class women are:

• Women living paycheck to paycheck

• Women with jobs but no benefits

• Women who do care work for others but can’t afford their own healthcare

• Women juggling multiple jobs to survive

• Women excluded from generational wealth and elite networks

And yes—many of them are women of color, immigrants, and single mothers.

Their feminism looks different.

Because their lives are different.

Real Life Doesn’t Look Like Instagram Feminism

On the ground, feminism isn’t filtered.

• It’s fighting for shift flexibility without losing your job

• It’s trying to unionize without getting blacklisted

• It’s bringing your baby to work because there’s no childcare

• It’s choosing between lunch or a bus fare home

This isn’t a branding issue.

It’s survival.

Intersectionality Means Including Economic Justice

When Kimberlé Crenshaw introduced the term intersectionality, it was about recognizing overlapping forms of oppression.

That includes class oppression.

Feminist liberation without:

• Housing rights

• Labor protections

• Healthcare access

• Safe transportation

• Affordable childcare

…is just privilege in a protest tee.

Workplace Feminism Must Go Beyond Offices

Most mainstream feminist wins have focused on:

• Boardroom diversity

• Maternity leave

• Equal pay in white-collar jobs

Important—but incomplete.

What about:

• Paid sick leave for grocery workers?

• Wage theft from undocumented cleaners?

• Assault protection for night shift workers?

Until feminism protects the most precarious, it’s not equity—it’s elitism.

The Feminization of Poverty

Women globally earn less, own less, and suffer more financial instability. And the most impacted?

• Single mothers

• Elderly women

• Women of color

• Migrant workers

• Disabled women

According to UN Women, women and girls perform 76.2% of unpaid care work worldwide.

And when paid, care jobs are the lowest paid across every country.

Feminism cannot just ask why aren’t there more women CEOs?

It must ask why are so many women one emergency away from homelessness?

What Class-Inclusive Feminism Looks Like in Practice

• Support Worker Strikes: From Starbucks baristas to Amazon warehouse staff, worker resistance is feminist resistance.

• Demand Universal Basic Services: Healthcare, housing, education, childcare—these are gender justice issues.

• Expand Labor Rights for Domestic & Informal Workers: These women deserve contracts, protection, and fair pay.

• Decriminalize Survival: This includes sex work, street vending, and undocumented labor.

• Fund Community Care Models: Mutual aid, cooperatives, and community land trusts uplift working-class women directly.

Listen to Working-Class Voices

Some of the most urgent feminist voices aren’t on social media—they’re organizing in neighborhoods, churches, unions, and housing collectives.

Feminism needs fewer influencers and more organizers.

Honor:

• The Black women leading rent strikes

• The Indigenous matriarchs protecting water and land

• The domestic workers writing their own labor laws

• The grocery store clerks exposing unsafe conditions during pandemics

Their work is feminist history in motion.

Case Study: Domestic Workers United (New York)

This powerful grassroots group of Caribbean, Latina, and African women fought for and won the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights in New York.

Their demands?

• Paid days off

• Legal protections against harassment

• Overtime pay

• Respect

This was feminism from below.

And it changed the law.

Solidarity Means Redistribution, Not Charity

Too often, upper-middle-class feminism looks like:

• Donating instead of dismantling

• Posting about inequality without challenging your own privilege

• “Helping” working-class women without listening to them

Real solidarity says:

“What am I willing to give up so others can thrive?”

It means wealth redistribution.

It means elevating others’ leadership.

It means stepping back so others can step in.

Feminist Class Betrayal Is Powerful

If you’ve benefited from class privilege:

• Use your voice to platform working-class organizers

• Pay people equitably—not “what they’ll take,” but what’s fair

• Educate your peers about labor exploitation

• Push for equity in schools, workplaces, neighborhoods

• Fight against gatekeeping in feminist spaces

Class betrayal—choosing justice over comfort—is a feminist act.

How Capitalism Hijacks Feminist Language

Beware:

• “Girlboss” culture that glorifies individual success but exploits other women

• Empowerment campaigns that ignore sweatshop labor

• Feminist merch made in factories paying women pennies

• Corporate feminism that sponsors panels but refuses unions

If your feminism is built on someone else’s suffering—it’s not feminism.

It’s whitewashed capitalism.

Toward a Feminist Labor Revolution

Imagine a world where:

• Every worker has rights and rest

• No one is shamed for needing public assistance

• Feminist unions rewrite what fairness looks like

• Wealth is not hoarded, but shared

• Feminism meets people where they are—not where privilege lives

This is not a dream.

It’s a blueprint—already being drawn by working-class women every day.

If It’s Not for Everyone, It’s for No One

Feminism that fails the working class is feminism that fails, period.

It’s not enough to climb the ladder.

We must dismantle the system that keeps others on the ground.

The revolution won’t be branded.

It will be built—by hands that work, protest, clean, feed, nurse, and resist.

That is where feminism lives.

And that is where we must follow.