OUR PHILOSOPHY IS SIMPLE

Economic growth should mean opportunities for everyone

why we need good jobs

Nashville is booming, but at what cost?

The current workforce development pipeline is broken. Rather than economic growth leading to prosperity for all, pervasive gentrification and displacement have become the expected result of success.

For us, this is simply unacceptable.

At Good Jobs Nashville, we see economic growth as a valuable opportunity to create pathways to meaningful employment and to address the city’s growing racial and economic inequality. When success comes to Music City, we believe that it should benefit working-class people just as much as wealthy developers and tech giants.

That’s our purpose: to be your one-stop shop for connecting growing businesses with local workers.

Our History

Good Jobs Nashville grew out of a grassroots movement dedicated to empowering our working-class and marginalized communities to stand up against racial inequity, economic inequality, and social injustice.

Our communities have come together to demand economic development that doesn’t leave blue-collar families behind. Time and time again, we’ve proven to our neighbors that we can win when we come together. We’ve won a Community Benefits Agreement on one of South Nashville’s largest redevelopment projects in decades. We’ve won higher safety standards for construction workers on publicly-funded projects. We’ve won more thorough accountability standards for corporations that receive public tax dollars. Simply put, we do have the people power to make sure that “a rising tide lifts all boats” in the city of Nashville.
As our movement continues to gain momentum, we are determined to ensure that life-changing job opportunities reach the people of Nashville who need them the most.
We are focused on capitalizing on this once-in-a-generation chance to align the city’s workforce with its development. By organizing around and winning opportunities for all Nashvillians, we can expand our communities and create high-quality vocational work, ultimately changing the fabric of our beautiful city forever.

Good Jobs Nashville serves as a coalition of union organizers, churches, and hard-working families with a common goal—to make Nashville a place where everyone can thrive. We address racial and economic inequality through strategic research, popular education, and community organizing. By uniting with our neighbors to create a culture of shared prosperity, we’re able to fight systemic poverty with intentional actions focused on public investments and city planning.
More specifically, we promote the opportunities that grassroots movements are winning for Nashville’s working-class families and serve as a liaison between employers, candidates, and communities seeking economic success. By fostering relationships between business partners and working Nashvillians, we strive to support all of our stakeholders in achieving mutual prosperity.

Our mission

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Stronger Communities = A Stronger Nashville

We believe that a city’s success can be measured by whether or not economic success and growth extends to its hardest-working families. That’s why our vision is rooted in community engagement intentionally focused on bringing the benefits of our city’s development to all of Nashville’s communities. You can support this mission by giving what you can to Good Jobs Nashville’s parent organization, Stand Up Nashville, where every contribution goes directly towards funding our efforts to place working-class people at the center of big decisions!

Meet our team

Nathaniel Carter

Director of Workforce Development – Stand Up Nashville

A rare Nashville native, Nathaniel Carter has served as Director of Workforce and Employment at Stand Up Nashville since 2021. Prior to this position, Carter was a wireman in the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (Nashville Local 429) and has used his valuable experience in the apprenticeship program to travel the country, operating as a community liaison in union trades. In his present role, Carter uses grassroots organizing and coalition-building to create new opportunities to Nashville’s working-class communities. Carter currently resides in Spring Hill with his two children.

Sam Malick-Petschulat

Program Director of Music City Construction Careers, Good Jobs Nashville – Central Labor Council

A native of Nashville, Sam Malick-Petschulat holds a B.A. in English and Economics and Masters of Social Work from the University of Tennessee and currently serves as Program Director of Music City Construction Careers and Good Jobs Nashville for the Central Labor Council of Nashville and Middle TN. His background includes a combination of community organizing, electoral organizing, and program management at organizations including SEIU Local 205, the Missouri Dept. of Human Services, Bernie Sanders 2020, and Workers Dignity. He combines these experiences with a vision of achieving radical economic equity through labor organizing to strengthen the Middle Tennessee labor movement and working families’ communities in Nashville. Off the clock, he can usually be found gardening with his wife Kaitlin, entertaining his cats, or reading a good book.