In Depletion, Shirin M. Rai examines the human costs of caring and how these are reproduction across the boundaries of class, race, gender, and generation. Including case studies from different parts of the world and building on various methodologies, Rai looks at the costs of care work, or "social reproduction" in several forms. She examines the costs of commuting to work and for care, the value of unpaid work performed by women of different classes, the costs of caring performed by children, and the costs to communities when local economies and ecologies are challenged by corporate interests. Importantly, Rai argues that depletion must be recognized in order for it to be reversed-the struggles to reverse depletion are struggles for a good life, generative of new imaginings of how caring and care work, both draining and joyful, can be reorganized for a better future for all.