Code and Cradle

BOOK DESCRIPTIONCode and Cradle: AI's Silent War on Women's Economic SurvivalWhile Silicon Valley celebrates artificial intelligence as humanity's great equalizer, a darker reality unfolds in care homes, retail floors, and office cubicles worldwide: AI is waging a silent war on women's economic survival. Drawing on authoritative data from the International Labour Organization, OECD, UN Women, and McKinsey, alongside harrowing survivor testimonies from São Paulo's favelas to California's tech corridors, Code and Cradle exposes the brutal truth behind the algorithms-women face nearly triple the automation risk of men, with 107.8 million female jobs globally at severe risk of AI displacement.
This groundbreaking feminist economic critique reveals how generative AI doesn't just automate work; it systematically targets female-dominated sectors-caregiving, retail, and administrative roles-where women comprise 70-85% of workers. Dr. Naim Tahir Baig meticulously documents how biased hiring algorithms perpetuate discrimination, how tech optimism masks devastating poverty feminization, and how policy frameworks from Brussels to Brasília fail to protect the world's most vulnerable workers.
Through intersectional analysis spanning race, class, and geography, the book illuminates how Black women in Brazilian favelas, Latina caregivers in the United States, and displaced administrative workers in Europe bear the compounded burdens of algorithmic exclusion. But Code and Cradle is more than an indictment-it's a call to arms. Blending rigorous data analysis with visceral storytelling in the tradition of #MeToo-era activism, this book provides readers with concrete policy blueprints, grassroots resistance strategies, and a vision for feminist AI governance.
From mandatory gender bias audits to favela-based reskilling collectives, Dr. Baig charts pathways toward digital justice. With the urgency of a manifesto and the precision of academic research, Code and Cradle equips economists, policymakers, activists, and every woman navigating the AI revolution with the knowledge to fight back-before the algorithms rewrite our futures without us. Essential reading for anyone concerned with gender equity, economic justice, and the human cost of technological transformation.
Praise for Code and Cradle"A devastating exposé that every tech leader, policymaker, and citizen must read. Dr. Baig's intersectional analysis reveals the hidden war being waged against women's economic survival-and provides the weapons to fight back.""Rigorous, enraging, and ultimately hopeful. This book does for AI what The Feminine Mystique did for post-war domesticity-it names the oppression and demands systemic change.""From Silicon Valley's boardrooms to São Paulo's favelas, Dr.
Baig traces AI's gendered violence with forensic precision. A landmark work of feminist economics for the algorithmic age."