beyond the work force

I’m David Graves, father, strategist, and Executive Board member of my union. I built Beyond the Workforce to cut through the noise and tell the truth about what’s happening to workers in America. No politics. No sugarcoating. Just real strategies to protect our livelihoods, rebuild our power, and make sure no worker gets left behind.

About Beyond the Workforce

Created by David Graves

I didn’t create Beyond the Workforce to be “just another blog.”

I built it because I’m done watching working people get squeezed, discarded, and talked down to by the very systems that claim to protect us. I’ve lived the grind. I’ve seen how quickly the work can dry up, how promises disappear when the pressure’s on, and how too many so-called leaders get comfortable while the rank and file struggle to survive.

I’m a father, a strategist, and I serve on the Executive Board of my union. I’ve spent my career on the job site and in the room where decisions get made, and I know exactly how the game is played. Beyond the Workforce is my way of flipping the table, telling the truth, and pushing for the kind of real change that doesn’t come from slogans or speeches.

This is where I speak plainly about what’s happening to workers in America. Automation. Corporate consolidation. Outsourcing. Political posturing. And yes, union leadership that sometimes forgets who they work for. If we want to survive the next decade as a working class, we can’t afford to be polite about it.

What I Stand For

I believe in workers owning their future, not waiting for permission to protect it. I believe:

  • Unions should serve the members. Period.

  • Transparency isn’t optional, it’s mandatory.

  • If we don’t control our treasury, we don’t control our future.

  • Financial sovereignty is a survival strategy.

  • Training and job placement must evolve to match reality.

  • Real strength comes from defending labor, not playing political favorites.

  • Brotherhood, sisterhood, and loyalty should mean something again.

Beyond the Workforce is more than my voice, it’s a call to action. It’s about educating, provoking, and rebuilding the soul of the labor movement. It’s about making sure no worker is left behind, whether that’s financially, professionally, or personally.

If you’re tired of being fed the same tired lines while your paycheck and security disappear, you’re in the right place.

Let’s go beyond the slogans. Beyond the politics. Let’s go Beyond the Workforce.

What is Beyond the Workforce

Beyond the Workforce is a battle cry for every worker who’s been ignored, underpaid, misled, or sold out. It’s not a think piece, it’s a firestorm. We expose the lies no one else will touch, call out the failures no one else wants to own, and write with the raw, unfiltered urgency of someone who’s lived it. This isn’t about nostalgia, it’s about power. Real power. The kind that rebuilds unions from the ground up, makes workplaces worth staying in, and forces the world to remember that labor isn’t the problem, it’s the answer.

time + skill + experince = labor

Beyond The Workforce isn’t just a blog.

It’s a declaration of everything the labor movement has forgotten, and everything working people still deserve. We call out the truth about a rigged economy, corporate manipulation, and union leaders who’ve gotten too comfortable while their members lose everything. We expose the lie that labor is a cost to be managed, instead of what it actually is, the origin of all value.

This is where we tear down broken systems, unapologetically. This is where we build something better, intentionally.

I write the way I’ve worked my whole life, shoulder to shoulder with real people, covered in dust, sweat, and clarity. No polish. No pretending. Just purpose.

What I publish here hits hard. It’s not sanitized. It’s not cleared through PR. And it doesn’t care what side of the aisle you sit on. If you're complicit in the problem, you're going to feel it.

Here’s what I’m not afraid to say:

Social Security is a government-run Ponzi scheme, and the people counting on it the most are the ones it's failing first.

The American film industry is being gutted, outsourced, and abandoned, while lawmakers in Sacramento pass out tax credits like party favors with no understanding of the economic engine they’re choking.

DEI doesn’t work when workplaces are unsafe. You can’t put glitter on structural dysfunction and call it inclusion. Real equity starts with safety, clarity, and accountability, not slogans.

Unions are bleeding out quietly, predictably, and unnecessarily, strangled by outdated labor law, right-to-work poison pills, and internal leadership that fears bold moves more than it fears irrelevance.

The 60/40 retirement portfolio is dead, and workers are being marched toward financial ruin while Wall Street sells them "moderate risk" with zero upside.

Bitcoin isn’t fringe, it’s financial sovereignty, and any union not exploring it is sleepwalking into another century of dependence on collapsing institutions.

The culture war is a distraction, while workers argue about bathrooms and pronouns, corporations steal their pensions and rewrite the law.

The American worker is over-leveraged, underpaid, misled, and ignored. And the institutions that were supposed to protect them are too scared to speak up.

Some people get pissed when they read this.
 

Good.

This isn’t for the ones trying to protect their seat at the table. It’s for the ones ready to flip the whole damn table over.

I don’t write for clicks. I write for change. And I believe labor can lead again, not by clinging to nostalgia or playing political dress-up, but by becoming what it was always meant to be: brutally honest, fiercely independent, and relentlessly innovative.

That’s the mission. That’s the movement. That’s Beyond the Workforce.


David Thomas Graves
Founder, Beyond the Workforce