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Labor Day
Hypocrisy
Part 3 - Part 1
Here
By Stephen Lendman
09/03/07 "ICH"
-- -- Labor Day is commemorated on the first Monday in
September each year since the first one was celebrated in New
York in 1882. Around the world outside the US, socialist and
labor movements are observed on May 1 to recognize organized
labor's social and economic achievements and the workers in
them. This day gets scant attention in the US, but where it's
prominent it's commonly to remember the Haymarket Riot of May 4,
1886 in Chicago. It followed the city's May 1 general strike for
an eight hour day that led to violence breaking out on the 4th.
Labor Day became a national federal holiday when Congress passed
legislation for it in June, 1894 at a time working people had
few rights, management had the upper hand, only wanted to
exploit them for profit, and got away with it. It took many
painful years of organizing, taking to the streets, going on
strike, holding boycotts, battling police and National Guard
forces, and paying with their blood and lives before real gains
were won. They got an eight hour day, a living wage, on-the-job
benefits and the pinnacle of labor's triumph in the 1930s with
the passage of the landmark Wagner Act establishing the National
Labor Relations Board (NLRB). It guaranteed labor the right to
bargain collectively on equal terms with management for the
first time ever.
All of it was won from the grassroots. Management gave nothing
until forced to and neither did government. It always sides with
business never yields a thing unless threatened with disruptive
work stoppages or possible insurrection. All this is in a
democracy that claims to be a government of the people, by the
people and for the people, most of whom are ordinary working
class ones.
Since a worried Congress passed the 1935 Wagner Act during The
Great Depression, the state of organized labor declined,
especially post-WW II. It accelerated precipitously during the
Reagan years under an administration openly hostile to worker
rights in its one-side support for management. It continued
unabated, under Republican and Democrat administrations, and
today stands at a multi-generational low.
Under George Bush conditions got much worse. Since coming into
office in 2001, he sided with management openly on policies to
strip workers of their right to organize and be able to bargain
for a living wage and essential benefits. He hired anti-union
officials, denied millions overtime pay, cut pay raises for 1.8
million federal workers claiming a "national emergency," and
schemed to end Social Security as we know it by plotting
(unsuccessfully so far) to let Wall Street sharks take it over.
Since labor's ascendency decades earlier, corporate America, in
league with government, shamelessly denigrated unions and the
rights of working people in them. In 1958, 34.7% of the work
force was unionized, but now the figure is around 12% overall,
and only
7.4% in the private sector - the lowest it's been in seven
decades.
Even worse, most jobs are low-pay service sector ones because
the nation's manufacturing base and many higher-paying positions
in finance and technology have been offshored to low-wage
developing nations. Workers there can be hired for a fraction of
the pay scales here or as virtual serfs at below poverty wages
as low as $2 a day or less and no benefits. They fill legions of
sweatshop factory jobs in countries prohibiting unions and fair
worker practice standards for Wal-Mart's "Always low prices" on
the backs of ruthlessly exploited working people.
Nonetheless, on the first Monday each September, this nation
"remembers" working Americans with a federally-mandated holiday
in their "honor." Who's celebrating when it's disingenuously
commemorated at a time worker rights are threatened, ignored,
forgotten, and uncared about by heartless governments beholden
to capital. They scorn working people who are no longer as
deceived with meaningless bread and circus droppings at the
expense of what they need most: good jobs at good pay, essential
benefits, job security, and a government on their side doing
what counts most - supporting their rights with worker-friendly
legislation.
Workers are reminded every day that backing like that is off the
table by governments shamelessly mocking their day. It's
commemorated in name only by a nation beholden to capital, the
corporate giants controlling it, and the best democracy their
money can buy for them alone.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net .
Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to
The Steve Lendman News and Information Hour on
TheMicroEffect.com Saturdays at noon US central time.
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