Labor Day Reflections: Work, Change, and What Comes Next
I hope you’re having a great Labor Day weekend with family and friends. For most of my life, Labor Day was just the “last day of summer” — a Monday off before school started and fall got underway. I never thought much about why we have it in the first place. But lately, I’ve been digging deeper into these markers in American life, and this one has a fascinating, and sobering, history.
Labor Day began as a celebration of workers, pushed by unions in the late 1800s. It became a federal holiday in 1894 after a massive strike, the Pullman Strike — shut down train lines from the Midwest to the West Coast. At its peak, 250,000 workers walked off the job, and at least 30 people died in riots in Chicago. Congress’ response was to declare Labor Day a national holiday, giving federal workers a day off.
That’s why we’re grilling in the backyard today.
For decades, unions weren’t just powerful; they shaped the direction of the country. In 1954, more than a third of American workers were union members. Groups like the United Automobile Workers weren’t just fighting for their members’ paychecks, they played a huge role in pushing for Medicare, Medicaid, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It was dangerous work, too. Walter Reuther, the legendary head of the UAW, survived being shot at his home and lost the use of his right arm. A year later, his brother was shot and lost an eye. Neither crime was ever solved.
Fast forward to today, and just 9.9% of workers are in unions. Teachers, airline crews, nurses, postal workers, police, and firefighters still have strong representation, but most workers don’t. Unions used to be one of the strongest forces in American politics, but even their rank-and-file members have fractured politically. The Teamsters just announced they’re backing Republicans in swing districts. We’re living in a time of weakening institutions, and labor is no exception.
And here’s the kicker: the conversation is shifting from “how do we protect workers” to “what happens when human labor isn’t needed at all?”
Automation was a flashpoint in last year’s Hollywood writers’ strike and the dockworkers strike, but those are just early warning signs. Almost half of American jobs are either repetitive cognitive or repetitive manual tasks, which makes them prime candidates for AI and automation. I spoke with an executive at a major bank who told me they expect half their workforce to be gone in the next three years because of AI. Jobs like customer service, sales, and marketing analytics, none of them unionized, are all on the chopping block.
I keep asking myself: who’s the Walter Reuther of today? Who’s going to lead workers through this new era? Reuther didn’t just fight for autoworkers; he co-founded Earth Day because he understood how deeply labor issues are connected to everything else. That kind of leadership is hard to find now.
A tech entrepreneur said something to me last week that’s stuck with me: “AI will be the knockout blow to human labor.” It’s chilling, but I think he’s right. We’ve been heading this way for a long time. Our time and energy, the value of being human in the workforce — is becoming more and more marginal.
Maybe the future isn’t about unions in the traditional sense, but about a movement that brings people together across sectors, classes, and politics to redefine what a good life looks like in an age where machines do the bulk of the work. That’s the next big labor question: not how to keep things the way they are, but how to create a future worth living in when human labor isn’t the center of the economy anymore.
Labor Day has always been about honoring workers. Maybe it’s time we start honoring work itself, and imagining what’s next.