Labor Day

Labor Day is nearly upon us, but what does it really mean? It has no religious, patriotic, gift-giving or card-sending significance. Of course, to an old humbug like me, that is a good thing.

Labor Day had a lot of meaning for my father. When he was 14 years old in 1930, he quit school and went to work in the anthracite mines near Scranton. The mines weren't unionized then and he worked 12 hour days six days per week. He was paid the princely sum of 50 cents per ton of coal that he blasted, dug, and loaded. On a good day, he'd do 12 tons and receive all of $6.

Well, not exactly all of $6. He had to buy his own dynamite form the coal company, pay for his miner's hat and the batteries for its light, and cough up big bucks for his tools. After his first week of work, after loading 60 tons or so of coal, he broke even. He always remembered the let-down of receiving an empty pay envelope.

After the mines were unionized, the work didn't get any easier, cleaner, or healthier, but the work day was reduced to eight hours and the coal companies had to provide workers with the tools of the trade.

Today, many people blame the unions for the ills of the American steel, auto and other industries. "How can those teachers strike for more money when I can barely pay my taxes?"

My father would reply that if it wasn't for labor unions as an opposing force to management, no one would have the eight hour work day, paid holidays, vacations, and company-paid insurances. Granted, unions have overstepped their bounds, become corrupt, and short-sightedly ruined some industries. Also, it's not 1930 and we're not in the midst of a Great Depression. Still, management is as greedy today as it was then and labor is a great target for exploitation.

Perhaps the meaning of Labor Day is that those who established it insured that today's first pay envelope will not be empty.