Miller is a local author, professor at San Diego City College, and vice president for the American Federation of Teachers, Local 1931. He lives in Golden Hill.
In the United States, we celebrate the labor movement in September on Labor Day, an occasion now known more for backyard barbecues than unions marching in the street. Thus, most Americans don’t know much about May Day and, if they do, they associate it with the state-sponsored holiday in the former Soviet Union. The truth of the matter, however, is that May Day has deep American roots.
It started in 1866 as part of the movement pushing for the eight-hour workday. Back then, as historian Jacob Remes reminds us:
“The demand for an eight-hour day was about leisure, self-improvement and freedom, but it was also about power. When Eight Hour Leagues agitated for legislation requiring short hours, they were demanding what had never before happened: that the government regulate industry for the advantage of workers. And when workers sought to enforce the eight-hour day without the government — through declaring for themselves, through their unions, under what conditions they would work — they sought something still more radical: control over their own workplaces. It is telling that employers would often counter a demand for shorter hours with an offer of a wage increase. Wage increases could be given (and taken away) by employers without giving up their power; agreeing to shorter hours was, employers knew, the beginning of...
Over the last year, beyond traditional healthcare and federal procurement matters, the government has pursued federal False Claims Act (FCA) investigations and enforcement across high-risk areas, i...