Happy Labor Day, friends of Democracy!

Click here to find Labor Day events sponsored by labor organizations in Dubuque, Cedar Rapids, Keokuk, Mason City, Sioux City, East Moline, Des Moines, Burlington, Iowa City, Council Bluffs

Click here to find more Labor Day events in Humboldt, Des Moines, Newton, Ames, Independence, Sioux City, Cedar Rapids, Spirit Lake, Iowa City, Decorah, Cedar Falls

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What does Labor Day mean to you?  My dad was a factory worker and a loyal union guy. He found meaning in his job through solidarity. Walking the picket line when the workers were out on strike was a point of pride with him, I remember.

When my brother graduated from high school he also found work in a factory and joined the union. It was good paying work and you were considered successful if you had a good union factory job. Eventually, he was laid off as the factory jobs began to disappear and he found a job in sales.

I had to read Studs Terkel’s book “Working” in grad school. Even though it was assigned and I would probably not have picked it up on my own, I found it fascinating and read it cover to cover. There was one quote that I remembered all these years and that was (as I remember it) something like, “People don’t need jobs. People need meaningful work and a way to make a living.” 

“It is about a search, too, for daily meaning as well as daily bread, for recognition as well as cash, for astonishment rather than torpor; in short, for a sort of life rather than a Monday through Friday sort of dying. Perhaps immortality, too, is part of the quest. To be remembered was the wish, spoken and unspoken, of the heroes and heroines of this book.”

― Studs Terkel, Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do

The jobs may have changed and modernized but the nature of being a working person in America has probably not changed that much in many ways.

Working is available on Amazon: