Labor Day 2025, hits different this year.

 

-Norman Rockwell, "The Lineman" 1948

Labor Day 2025.  

Usually Labor Day is the perfect holiday for me.  No expectations to buy or fulfill some ritual - just a day to celebrate working people and spend time with the ones you love.  

I did that part.  I had dinner with my wife and sons (and my older son's wife and son).  Saw a movie with my younger son, enjoyed to perfect weather, spent time with my lovely wife.  But the part where we celebrate the working people of the world?  Felt different.

I started a new job in 2025.  A position I trained and worked hard to move into.  One that was something I could work in with stability and maybe retire out of.  I was proud of what I had accomplished.

Then the President of the United States and The Wealthiest Man in the World created a scheme to take away my livelihood.  I had never missed a day, I had never had anything but positive statements in my review, I had never not fulfilled a single duty of that position.  None of that mattered.  

The Unions sued for breach of contract (which is was) and won and then Donald J. Trump declared almost all Federal Employee Unions illegal.  In one fell swoop he became the most Anti-Worker, Anti-Union President in a century.  The NTEU had represented Treasury Workers for 87 years. The NLRB, which has functioned for 90 years, was declared unconstitutional.

Worker's rights are being eroded like every other right American's have enjoyed since the New Deal.  My Governor is calling a special session to take away Congressional representation for my city. I fear for my family, I fear for my community. I fear for my nation, I fear for the world.

People speak out - we were not silent, my city joined my nation in a giant Labor Day Middle Finger towards those who would unravel this thing called America.

https://fox4kc.com/news/workers-unions-community-members-gather-for-mass-rally/

But despite this the reality of the Post-Prosperity America has hit most of us:

Americans Lose Faith That Hard Work Leads to Economic Gains, WSJ-NORC Poll Finds

https://www.wsj.com/economy/wsj-norc-economic-poll-73bce003?reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

That sounds astoundingly negative - but is it wrong?  After a BRIEF period of post-covid employee empowerment aided by the Joe Biden being the most Pro-Labor President of my lifetime - the new reality is setting in.   Corporations collude to lay off and downsize workers even in years of record breaking profits and know they are not limited by courts, lawmakers, or mass/social media because they own all three.  The astonishingly wealthy President and Richest Man in the World who decided the world could not afford the good health insurance my child has had these last 8 months both own their own Social Media platforms where they elevate their own ideas of a world of Avarice and Suffering and suppress any notions of the dignity of hard work, honesty, and integrity.

I fear for this world.  The world could lose all the billionaires tomorrow and we would *ALL* be just as fine or better off for it.  We could not say the same about Linemen, Plumbers, Teachers, IT People, Sanitation Workers or Nurses.

I am still proud of my working class heritage and values.  But I fear for a world where it is open season on the people who get the work done.