Bless Your Organized Blue Collar
On this Labor Day 2023, while most of us are lucky enough to not be working, I want to share my appreciation for the American blue collar laborer.
All of us work with our brains, but not all of us work with our brains and bodies . This post is for the people who use their all to keep America growing—in more ways than one.
So many of our work benefits and human rights protections were brought by the organized persistence of the blue collar workers in America, including:
Blue collar know-how has shaped the American workplace in significantly positive ways. As the daughter of a building trades labor union president, I saw first-hand how my Dad negotiated across the table to represent laborers but also understand the needs of business.
This work was more challenging for him than crawling through smokestacks or getting caught on an elevator in a steel mill during a fire (all of which happened). It took time and resilience to find consensus. Collective effort on behalf of a greater good to give voice to the many without deep pockets is another plus to labor unions in a capitalist economy.
Dad was a construction worker in insulation (which used to be asbestos) and worked on hundreds of jobs throughout his career, from Ohio to Missouri. He built steel plants, margarine and chocolate factories, coal and nuclear power plants, and skyscrapers. I remember him telling us about being on the top of the stack of a nuclear plant (Fermi) on Lake Erie when the Edmond Fitzgerald took its maiden voyage. When I was young, he used to put a piece of tape on a window for each floor of downtown buildings so when we drove past he could show us kids how much progress they had made.
Construction laborers and miners in particular are inherently in a line of work that includes more risk to bodily harm, but thankfully those with representation have safer worksites. These benefits have carried over to those outside the building trades as well.
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Most of Dad's colleagues died young, from the affects of asbestosis, as the industry was moving toward the use of safer materials. In elementary school, I remember hearing there was a workplace accident and not knowing whether my father was okay. Those of us in white collar roles have our blue collar friends to thank for paving the way for today's more wholistic view of workplace safety that goes well beyond bodily protection. Safety from sexual harassment, bullying, and other nuances of workplace conditions are important advancements as well.
So next time you're in a building, take a moment to think about all the skilled trades that contributed to it, and to your worker protections:
Blue collars deserve a big blessing on Labor Day—and every day.