Vintage Labor Day Celebrations

Labor Day is an American holiday to celebrate working people and their contributions. It was born out of the organized labor movement, specifically the Pullman Strike in 1894. The original meaning of the holiday is often overlooked in the 21st century, but it used to be the main focus of Labor Day, as you can see in 16 vintage photos of the celebration at mental_floss. Shown here is a union float from a Labor Day parade in 1909, and a community barbecue from 1940. Link


Unfortunately nature took its course and the union leaders became just as thieving and backstabbing as the companies they were meant to oppose and in many instances were bought by those companies.
Some of them spent most of their time in luxury funded by the workers and extorting money from the employers.
It just became a protection racket.
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What beautiful vintage pictures. Even though I know it's a bit of a fallacy, I love how picturesque things looked, liked times were better. I blog about swing dancing and vintage stuff at Girl in the Jitterbug Dress (dot) com. I know the other thread talks about how labor unions are no longer needed and I agree, but was that the point of posting the picture? The pictures seem positive and community spirited :)
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Still yet, it was an idea that was tried, and if no one had ever tried to band workers together to combine their strength, we wouldn't have the five day workweek, the eight-hour workday, minimum wage laws, overtime compensation, or occupational safety laws.

Big business is full of corruption, and we still have it. Politics is full of corruption, and we still have it. Labor unions were formed to give some of that corrupting power to the workers, and we did away with most of that, at least here in the U.S.
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