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The week's question
In December 2024, in the thread "Re: BRK: Why Not XOM?", BreckHutHigh asked the members: "What about the long road trips with kids?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
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Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy
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Author: wzambon ✶❂🐝 BRONZE
SHREWD   😊 😞
Number: of 84361 
Subject: Labor Day
Date: 09/05/26 11:13 AM
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Americans will celebrate Labor Day in the traditional way: grilling, shopping mattress sales, and carefully avoiding any discussion of labor.

Labor Day honors workers. It is not supposed to encourage them.

In 1882, thousands of workers marched through New York demanding an eight-hour day, economic fairness, political representation, and the right to organize. Respectable newspapers worried that labor was becoming political.

Apparently workers trying to influence government was politics.

Corporations doing it was business.

That distinction has aged remarkably well.

A CEO can spend millions backing candidates, hire lobbyists, pressure lawmakers, demand tax breaks, and threaten to move jobs unless government cooperates. That is leadership.

Three warehouse workers discussing a union over lunch are troublemakers.

America eventually found a compromise: give workers a federal holiday.

Today, corporations celebrate Labor Day with cheerful graphics thanking employees for being “the backbone of America,” often while explaining why paying that backbone more would be economically reckless.

During a crisis, nurses, drivers, teachers, clerks, sanitation workers, and warehouse employees become “essential.”

Afterward, they become “labor costs” again.

essayx.substack.com - Labor day is no time to talk about
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This community has written 84,309 posts about US Policy. The article-length ones it recommended most:
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