Several days ago on my own blog, I asked many other bloggers the same question I'm now asking you:
What does the federal holiday, "Labor Day", really mean to you?
I'll post my own response after the break, but I'd appreciate anyone else's opinion on the holiday in comments.
Almost every year of my life, I have looked at Labor Day as some kind of marker of the end of summer. The public school system trains us this way, as it is the bell that rings in school around most of the country - either school starts right before or right after the holiday.
The vacation industry also reinforces that thought - many vacation accomodations have summer and then post-Labor Day prices, as demand drops off when kids return to school. And so, vacation is often thought of as something that occurs between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
Labor Day began as a way to rally workers to improve their lot with employer interests. As I posted earlier, 100 years ago unions won the acceptance of the 8-hour work day, which is something most take for granted as a standard - although today, it is more likely a goal than a reality. And yet, there will be no major celebrations, no publicly celebrated parties, no great public acknowledgement of this anniversary of the 8-hour work day, which brought rise to greater offtime and the leisure, information, entertainment and other industries that have been rewarded by it.
Last year I started wondering - what is the point of the federal holiday of Labor Day? What are people celebrating? I think I understand what the Federal Government believes citizens are celebrating with Thanksgiving, with Christmas, with Presidents Day, etc. But what is the belief - and reality - of our national celebration next Monday?
For some, a three day weekend. The end of summer. The return to school. No mail. A day of work while recognizing that others get the day as a paid holiday. All that and more, and yet, I suspect most Americans do not think even one minute about "labor" during the Labor Day holiday weekend.
I'm beginning to have sad feelings about this. It's not sad towards Americans, many of which are one or two generations removed from any widely recognized labor practice advancements that would improve their lot in life. No, it's sad towards the vested interests whose responsibility, I believe, should have been to focus the holiday for the purposes of the cause. Vested interests focus the Christmas holiday for the population, vested interests focus the 4th of July for the popuulation. But vested interests - primarily the labor institutions that are supposed to be advancing the causes of their working membership - have not advanced Labor Day. Alternatively, perhaps, the employer vested interests are succeeding - as the watering down of Labor Day as the de facto "End of Summer" holiday, any potential launchpad for initiatives for the working class is camouflaged, any potential bullhorn is muted. In fact, union-opposing interests use the holiday as a point to attack unions.
In any case, Labor Day as a celebrated holiday about labor and working is practically unexperienced.
I think it is a failure of creativity and a failure of focus that Labor Day has fell to such disrepair. Perhaps there's a reason why the garden of Labor doesn't grow for unions, and Labor Day is just an annual reminder of that. I don't know. But I do know that labor - and the pursuit of improving the lot of workers - could use this holiday much better to promote goals. And I don't think unions are equipped to do that.
So what to do? I have two differing thoughts on where our country should go from here with Labor Day.
The first is - an effort to end Labor Day as a national holiday. I'd like to see a national politician suggest doing just that. Let's have a debate on the merits. Why do we have it? What should we be doing with it? How much does it cost? What is the benefit? Do we just want to have an "End of Summer" holiday and leave it at that? I think we could use the debate - if only to strengthen our own ideas as to what labor is and what workers deserve. Not unions. Workers.
Of course, I really don't want the holiday eliminated. I want it celebrated and used like Christians use Christmas and lovers use Valentines Day - to promote what is good and beneficial to the cause. But that doesn't mean political speeches, and it doesn't mean proclamations and legislative resolutions and other meaningless folderol that masquerade as attention.
That means creative people, doing creative things, to promote creative benefits and value for the working class.
You know what does have the creativity to make Labor Day a real holiday for workers? The blogosphere. You know what has some outreach capability? The blogosphere. You know what could drive Labor Day into a higher profile annual marketing spot for improving actual specifics of every day working?
I think you do. And I think we should. Or else we should put Labor Day the official holiday to rest.