The *real* Labor Day is, of course, Mayday -- in celebration of the memory of the Haymarket riots and the labor struggle for the 4 hour day.How many folks do you know who work a 4 hour day and still are able to live a comfortable life? Just think how the unemployment problem would go away if people could live comfortably on what they earn working a 20 hour work week? And think of the stimulus to retail sales by all those re-newly employed workers.
Our ancestors were murdered, imprisoned, and beaten so that their children, their childrens' children, and their childrens' childrens' children would all reap rewards from their struggles in the Class War.
I know many people, much younger than I, whose health was irreparably damaged by being put on "salary" rather than an hourly wage, and then forced to regularly work 60, 70, and even 80 hours a week. Selling one's birthright for a bowl of porridge seems an apropos analogy here.
In the interests of full disclosure here, I used to be an IWW organizer and served on the General Executive Board.