Reflections On Labor Day 2013

From Paul Krugman:

... the fact is that economic inequality has soared over the past few decades, and while a handful of people have stratospheric incomes, a far larger number of Americans find that no matter how hard they work, they can’t afford the basics of a middle-class existence — health insurance in particular, but even putting food on the table can be a problem. Saying that they can use some help shouldn’t make us think any less of them, and it certainly shouldn’t reduce the respect we grant to anyone who works hard and plays by the rules.

But obviously that’s not the way everyone sees it. In particular, there are evidently a lot of wealthy people in America who consider anyone who isn’t wealthy a loser — an attitude that has clearly gotten stronger as the gap between the 1 percent and everyone else has widened. And such people have a lot of friends in Washington.

From Christine Owens:

For millions of workers, ground down by the daily grind, work takes more than it gives. One in four workers toils at wages too low to lift their families from poverty. Forty million get no paid leave. The share of workers with job-based health and retirement benefits declined 12.9 and 7.0 percentage points, respectively, between 1979 and 2010, while wage growth for the bottom 60 percent resulted roughly as much from increased hours as from higher pay.

Workers have had more than enough of far too little for way too long. That's why, across America, in cities large and small and states of every hue, workers are demanding the most basic workplace bargain -- the right to economic opportunity and security through their labor.

And from David Sirota (who provides 5 things Labor Day is really about - read them):

Though we all know when this holiday is and often use it to structure our yearly calendars, the modern version of this occasion has been almost completely divorced from its official meaning. Indeed, the most prominent and pervasive Labor Day iconography usually has nothing to do with the holiday’s actual point and everything to do with discount sales events, the beginning of big-time sports seasons and the last hurrah of summer. Even in the political sphere, much of the rhetoric around this day ends up being generalized platitudes about the economy and jobs, not specific discussions about the importance of organized labor. This, despite the fact that, as the Los Angeles Times notes, “The holiday is the creation of the labor movement, which wanted a holiday to honor workers — and highlight the need for labor reform laws.”

Above all, remember they built it.