Monday, September 3, 2012

Labor day

This year, it seems particularly appropriate to celebrate Labor Day: for the past couple of years, the labor movement in this country has been demonized by the right: in Wisconsin, teachers who gave up pay raises for pensions and other benefits are now being portrayed as greedy bloodsucking leeches, and are being stripped of those other benefits.  They are having their unionizing rights stripped from them too.
And with it's "we did build this" meme, the right is suggesting that anything great done by a business was done by the head of the company.  Obama is right on this: anything great was done with the help of infrastructure: roads, internet, post office, utilities, and every one of those did what they did with the help of their workforce.
But over the past two years, things have been paradise in corporate america: record profits, ridiculously low taxes.  All the while, working stiffs have seen jobs cut, pay curtailed, rights stripped, and workers demonized.
So I say, enough!  Here's to the great mass of workers!  

Yours, in unity,
N.

1 comment:

MikeDG said...

This is an interesting on a similar subject. The US political scene does seem more polarised than I can remember. http://www.cringely.com/2012/09/02/why-hardly-anyone-in-the-u-s-economy-feels-prosperous-anymore