Labour Day isn’t just an excuse for a long weekend. The idea behind a weekend is, some people actually do work hard enough through the week that they need two days of rest at the end of it, or the value of their labour will steadily decline over a relatively short period of time.
I’m no longer (thankfully) in the group for whom that is physically true, but posting seven days a week is exhausting in several rather unexpected ways, and so I’m taking time off the blogs and will see you all on Tuesday.
Of course, quite a lot of people (most people in the US, according to several studies I’ve seen) no longer have full employment with two days off each seven; the average worker has one to three part-time jobs, and substantial difficulties synching up their days off. This, plus the outrageous protests of, say, the fruit industry that they cannot find workers (try having fewer convictions for slavery and assault, more benefits, better wages…you get the picture) to pick one at random, is proof that those battles need to be re-fought. Some day they’ll be won again.
Meanwhile, enjoy this hands across the ocean video of Billy Bragg’s “There is Power in a Union” set to a slideshow of American workers through the 20th Century.
Stolen from Cord at the very good Mollygood, and here you thought gossip blogs were all fluff!
raincoaster 
That is a great video! Labor Day in the US does indeed have its roots in the labor movement which, sadly, has been Walmarted to death. I’m always amazed when I meet people who need a union most but are completely anti-union.
Enjoy your time off.
hugs,
Norma Rae
Enjoy taking a break. I know I will..it’s my birthday (even wackier, I was born ON labor day!)!! If I could, I would shut everything down so everyone could enjoy it…with pay of course.
Yes, and presents to you! Makes perfect sense to me.
Yes, WalMart has now been successfully unionized up here in Canuckistan. Yay Socialism! But we have to recognize that some of those large unions are themselves instruments of oppression. I support industry-specific unions, and I very much support reading Barbara Ehrenreich’s book Nickel and Dimed. Bait and Switch is good as well, but Nickel and Dimed is actually world-changing. It’s where the people in this video go from here…
You’re not still going on about unions are you? So last century.
So this Century, too, unless we can come up with a better solution. I mean, slavery continues, as the record of the sweatshop and fruit-picking industries show, and that’s several thousand years old. A hammer is an ancient design, but sometimes it’s just what you need to get the job done, no?
Definitely so This Century! But then I am biased. I thought all the good Christian employers followed the teaching of their leader and accept the Word; “for the labourer is worthy of his hire.”
Until they do, I will sing Billy Bragg’s other great song which begins –
“Stand up, all victims of oppression
For the tyrants fear your might
Don’t cling so hard to your possessions
For you have nothing if you have no rights”
YAY!
Yeah. Unions.
I worked in a union factory loading trucks with roofing products. My foreman came over one day and told me I’d be fired if I didn’t slow down. I asked him why, and he said that I was making the rest of the department look bad.
Yeah. Unions.
@ Bunk, I accept that there are bad events on the union side as well as on the employer’s side. Yet without the unions, you would still not have been paid sufficient to even think about buying a computer to make your comment on or have had sufficient time left after your 12 hour day to read rain’s post – in fact it is unlikely your parents would have been able to send you to school to learn to read.
YES, there have been union excesses – yet the benefits of unions to society still far outweigh those much publicised problems.
Archie– That was only one of many incidents. I saw so much sloth in that place I was embarrassed to work there, and getting paid to sit on my butt for 12-hour overtime shifts. Socialism does not reward for above average work, but instead encourages mediocrity by default.
Oh yeah, um there were no computers to buy back then unless you had a coupla hundred thousand laying around and a small warehouse to put the 10kb number cruncher in.
Bunk,you miss my point. Without Unions the share of the communal wealth which would be going to the actual production workers would still be completely minuscule. Whether the ruling class goes by the titles of King, Duke, Baron or Captain of Industry, Entrepreneur, Owner, the worker always gets as little as is sufficient to exist and sometimes not even that much. As for wasting money on safety for the workers, well, where is the profit in that?
I still agree there are problems with some unions and such excesses need to be stamped out.
America was able to develop an ethos, much the same as Australia, by developing as a rural society. Unions began in Cities and are caused by the concentration of workers around the centres of production. Unlike Australia, America failed to lose its “Wild West” attitude even though it is now largely urban in composition in that it has failed to become truly urban in its psyche.
It was the marches of the completely desperate during the Great Depression which terrified the Owners so much that they began to distribute the wealth of the nation in a slightly fairer way. Their great grandchildren have forgotten that lesson.
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Archie– I honestly appreciate your civility in this discussion. Unions prevented exploitation of the workers they represented in the early 1900’s, and later. I don’t deny that at all.
The problem that I have with Unions is that they are obsolete, yet they wield more power than they deserve.
We have minimum wage laws in effect that prevent the exploitation of the workers who have no talents other than to push brooms, making Unions obsolete.
I was a broom pusher/floor sweeper/toilet cleaner/pot scrubber once, but I didn’t expect a union to broker my wage. If I didn’t want the job for that pay, there was another guy behind me that did. I didn’t expect to live the rest of my life doing menial labor either.
I pay for menial labor now.
Unions artificially inflate the cost of pushing a broom (and other similar entry-level services) and I think that’s to the detriment of the broom-pusher, and to society in general.
Cordially,
Bunk
Bunk, I also appreciate your civility in what could easily become a slanging match. Should that happen, neither of us will learn anything at all :)
So we agree that early unionism was good, brought social change and improved the lot of the average person. I think we also agree that unions went into a period of excess.
Where we differ is in our reaction to those excesses. While you see unions as being obsolete and in need of disbandment, I see that as a very dangerous solution because the employers have not changed! Just as there are greedy people in unions, so there are greedy people employing them. I believe that should unions be disbanded then there will be a return to 19th century conditions. Not in a decade, but over time. By the beginning of the 22nd century, the benefits gained by the unions will be but a legend amongst the newly exploited masses.
I would rather see controls on unions and controls on the exploiting employer who so often does not see the people working for him but merely effects on the “bottom line”.
Successful CEO’s today are judged on their ability to engender loyalty amongst the workers while planning to either sack as many as possible or reduce the wage bill in any other possible way.
Raincoaster!
Do you know where Brian Atenes youtube-channel is this time? Is it secret or deleted?
It’s closed, but I don’t know whether that means deleted or just made private. I thought about emailing him, but decided to let him sit it out and make whatever decisions he wants to by himself. He knows how to reach me if he wants advice, but it’s my guess he doesn’t want any right now.
Maybe he’s making snotloads of money and decided to quit doing the YouTube thing and enjoy himself. Who knows?
Archie– We are in agreement, although we’re looking at unions from different angles. I see the “greedy” unions exploiting their members more than “greedy” employers exploiting their employees. If you like we can continue this discussion elsewhere before rain gets pissed.
Oh, and by the way, the comment about Americans having 2-3 part time jobs as the norm is bullshit.
Bunk you better tell the President of the United States that too.
Bunk, I used to be a business reporter. It’s NOT bullshit. The average American worker has something like 1.7 part-time jobs and has since the mid-Nineties.
The quote was 2 to 3 part time jobs, not 1.7. I’d like to see the statistics and what they were based on, as 1.7 seems high also.
Now if 1.7 jobs per the average American Family is the mean, I’d prolly buy that on face value given the teenager work force and that some families need two income earners to pay for the lifestyle they choose.
Not trying to piss you off, rain. Honest. Gotta source for your stats?
Fair enough. I will get back to you over the next day or so with sources. I wouldn’t make that up. Just jammed with work…one of my five yes five jobs.
E-mail this to Brian http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qu1l0sIETzM