If you like having a weekend, you can thank organized labor.  If you appreciate getting paid overtime when you work more than 8 hours, if you think it’s good that 8-year-olds aren’t slaving away in factories, if you enjoy basic standards of safety and dignity at your workplace, you should know that things didn’t just end up like this by magic.  Each one of these victories was paid for by long years of uphill toil and often the blood of labor’s pioneer leaders and brave rank and file workers. 

César Chávez, A. Philip Randolph, Samuel Gompers, Big Bill Haywood, John Lewis, and Sarah George Bagley are just a few of the men and women who put their lives on the line to fight for the rights that are now not only enjoyed by union workers, but all workers in the U.S. When labor wins higher standards for unions, those victories inevitably raise the bar for all workers.

So next time you hear someone bashing unions, ask them why they think they get paid sick days or health care or maternity leave… and if they think it’s due to their boss’s kind heart, you might want to suggest that they learn a thing or two about labor before knocking it.

Happy Thanksgiving from the San Diego County Building and Construction Trades Council and IBEW local 569.