Labor Day 2024 - Remember Ludlow, Remember Louis Tikas
The Ludlow coal strike and company-state assault that came to be known as the Ludlow Massacre took place in April 1914. The brutality used to quell the rising labor movement was abhorrent and for a few decades invited more caution from corporations trying to keep their workers in subservience. Ludlow made Greek immigrant, the Cretan-born Louis Tikas, both a hero and a martyr of the nascent union movement. It was not the only action – Haymarket may be better known -- but Ludlow was one of the more lethal ones.
Then came the War to End All Wars, the Great Depression, the New Deal, and WWII. The industrialized US saw the rise of the labor union.
Pendulum swings, economic ups and downs, the outsourcing of US jobs to cheaper markets and/or robotized factories brought a slow bleed of middle-class jobs, hard-won rights, and the labor movement. The last 20 years have seen the rise of the gig economy. Every worker for him/herself. And wages, already stagnated, dropped even lower. Meanwhile, the 1% graduated to hedge funds and lobbying firms and a lower net income tax rate than their secretaries paid. Or at least, that’s how Warren Buffett put it when he noted tax disparities.
Early efforts to revive the US labor movement started in the service industry, where so many jobs had gone as manufacturing dwindled. Teachers, nurses, and restaurant workers were the new Tikases, albeit working in a less violent milieu and fairing better in terms of physical survival. But not until the Biden administration has there been full-throated support for labor rights. In the past 3.5 years, 15.6 jobs have been added, of which some 9.4 million were recovered after Covid and 6.2 million were new. This is still a record surpassing even Obama’s.
At the same time, the US has seen a slew of new unions formed, a number of strikes culminating in successful contracts for Hollywood writers and factory workers with the big-three auto makers, and an overall rise in union membership. Labor is on the move again.
Monday, Sept. 2, is Labor’s Day. Up the union!
Why the Bloodiest Labor Battle in US History Matters Today
The Ludlow Massacre – The Nation, April 2, 2014
Why we still have to fight –
“It’s becoming clearer and clearer that our era can indeed be called “the postmodern 1930s”. The cost-of-living crisis, the growth of the far right, the violence, the disrespect for human rights and growing authoritarianism even by "centrist" governments, the feeling that a major war could start soon… All this looks very familiar, and the only difference is that this time, the planet is also burning.” – Judith Meyer, DiEM25 IT Coordinator, Aug 28, 2024