Nancy MacLean, historian and author of a wonderful book called Freedom is Not Enough: The Opening of the American Workplace, has written a terrific review of the book we've been discussing here.

About Hilda Solis and the possibilities for today's Labor Department, MacLean says almost the opposite of what I said yesterday, so I recommend it for a more cheering interpretation. Nancy MacLean is also intrigued by the Christian perspective Kim brings to the issue, and by the potential for an upsurge in faith-based labor activism. I am too (though I'll admit I'm not at all religious myself). But there was another dimension of this that interested me.

Most progressive Christians seem theologically inclined to emphasize mercy and forgiveness as opposed to talk of sin and hellfire. In her book, Kim half-apologizes for quoting religious texts on wage theft that may sound "harsh and judgmental." But I think on this issue most Americans would support a vengeful approach! Something along the lines of, say, Old Testament meets "Cops." As everyone here has pointed out, if you shoplift something valuable, like a TV, you go to prison. Yet if bosses steal that much from workers in unpaid wages, they - at worst - may have to pay some of it back. Wage theft is, for the employers, not a risk but a "no-interest loan," as Kim aptly puts it. Kim suggests that some high-profile violators be sent to prison to serve as an example. I wonder, why not send all repeat offenders to prison? And why not make prison for wage thieves a major political demand? Raw terror is a more powerful deterrent than regulation. I like Dean's point that perhaps this should be framed as a matter of law enforcement rather than regulation. Here in America, we mistrust regulation, but we do love to see the police catching the bad guys, and most people do think that sin should be punished. We certainly can't solve all our society's problems this way, but stealing is not ethically complicated.