Labor Day 2006

Labor Day is a national legal holiday that is over 100 years old. Over the years, it has evolved from a purely labor union celebration into a general "last fling of summer" festival.

It grew out of a celebration and parade in honor of the working class by the Knights of Labor in 1882 in New York. In 1884, the Knights held a large parade in New York City celebrating the working class. The parade was held on the first Monday in September. The Knights passed a resolution to hold all future parades on the same day, designated by them as Labor Day.
http://wilstar.com/holidays/laborday.htm

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I would say that the working classes haven’t progressed much further along in the struggle for equity. Regardless of what the nattering nabobs of punditry will say, there is no such thing as a ‘self-made’ man. No matter the station one is born into, we all depend on the sweat and labor of those who built the roads, the houses, the railroads and trucks. There is no way to escape that.

Our teachers have imparted knowledge to us. Nobody has taught themselves to speak, read, and write in isolation. We get our food from farmers. Our clothes from stores, who get them from factories. The list is endless. Hell, we don’t even make our own entertainment, we get it packaged. So, can we do away with that “self-made man’ crap?

Take a look around you. How many of us can point to something we need and use everyday that we made ourselves? Damn few of us I’ll bet. We depend on the labor of others for our everyday needs and wants. It’s time that we started, again, the struggle for equity in the ‘American Dream’ for the workers classes. And why stop there? Why not demand the same equity in the profits generated by their labor for all workers worldwide?

You want to stop terrorism, or at least cut it down? Give people a good-paying job, and the infrastructure necessary for a good life. Our international corporations are generating more than enough profits to divert some to this end. Let’s see if we can’t start thinking of people before profits.

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Workers feel the squeeze
By Robyn E. Blumner, Times Perspective Columnist
Published September 3, 2006
St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2006/09/03/Columns/Workers_feel_the_sque.shtml

When a man tells you that he got rich through hard work, ask him: "Whose?"
- Don Marquis, American humorist

With Labor Day approaching, it is time to assess the nature of work in this burgeoning Information Age. Are American workers better off than they were a couple of generations ago? Will they be better off in the future?

I can't imagine that many middle-class workers feel much optimism. America's middle class is being squeezed by soaring energy prices, rising health care costs and, here in Florida, insurance rates that are doubling and doubling again. The housing bubble is rapidly losing air, making the one asset that most Americans own less secure, while wage stagnation is making us poorer.

President Bush has been touting the health of the nation's economy, pointing to its vigorous productivity gains of 16.6 percent from 2000 to 2005. But what he doesn't say is that those gains have accrued exclusively to Bush's people - the owner class and other top dogs. While corporate profits are through the roof, the real median income of households headed by someone under 65 - the country's working families - has actually fallen 5.4 percent through the Bush years.

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