On one hand, it’s understandable that there is less labor coverage: The number of strikes and the percentage of workers in unions have declined sharply since organized labor’s heyday a half century ago. But let’s not forget the U.S. does have more than 140 million workers, and there are any number of stories to write about them. That’s why I was so dismayed to see so many news organizations cutting back labor coverage.

I’m still worried about the state and fate of labor coverage—it's mostly absent on television news, and, as media organizations continue downsizing, it may be one of the first things to go. Nonetheless, I am considerably less concerned than I was eight or so years ago. Then, corporate profits and the stock market were soaring to new highs year after year—sounds a lot like today—while America’s workers were being squeezed in countless ways. Wages were stagnating, pension and health coverage were growing worse, factory jobs were evaporating, many immigrant workers faced terrible exploitation, and there was a surge in off-the-clock work.

At that time, the news media were paying far too little attention to these issues, especially to how American corporations were raking in record profits while the typical worker was taking it on the chin. That’s the main reason I wrote my book, The Big Squeeze: Tough Times for the American Worker—to shed light on this disconcerting disconnect.

But ever since the Great Recession began in late 2007—thank you, Wall Street—the news media have devoted far more attention to workers. More and more reporters and editors concluded it was important to cover what was happening to workers—how they were being thrown out of their jobs, foreclosed upon, forced into part-time work, strong-armed into accepting wage freezes, relegated to long-term unemployment. The media’s interest in issues like these has remained high long after the recession ended, partly because the downturn opened the eyes of many reporters and editors to the plight of the American worker—and their eyes remain open. (Of course, it doesn’t hurt that editors see that these stories often attract a lot of readers.)

Beyond that, three recent movements have helped ensure more coverage of worker issues. Occupy Wall Street pushed the issue of income inequality into the national conversation, and although the Occupy movement has fizzled out, there continues to be a steady stream of stories, far more than five and 10 years ago, about income inequality—just think of the many articles about the astronomic ratio of CEO pay to that of regular workers.

More recently, the Fight for 15 movement has pushed the issue of low-wage work onto center stage, spurring a lot of coverage on what it’s like to live on $8 an hour flipping burgers. The Fight for 15 has given considerable momentum to various battles for a higher minimum wage—whether in conservative states such as Nebraska or Arkansas, or in liberal cities such as Seattle and San Francisco. Those battles have in turn generated a lot of coverage.