R World (Ron Davison muses aloud)
01 May 2026
Trump's Parade of Business Failures Continues
In the last year, the NASDAQ is up 20% and Donald Trump's stock is down 62%.
Happy Labor Day!
May 1 is International Workers' Day, observed as a labor holiday across most of the world.
The typical workweek then was 60 to 84 hours. (Where did they find the time to strike, right?)
How much longer did it take to get to a 40-hour workweek? About half a century. The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 initially capped the workweek at 44 hours; an amendment two years later brought it down to 40.
So, be patient. Keep pushing for change. Your grandchildren will thank you. Or would, if they did not assume that what they experience as normal had always been the case.
It traces back to the 1886 strikes for an eight-hour workday in the United States, which culminated in the Haymarket affair in Chicago. Three years later, the international labor movement chose May 1 as the day to commemorate that struggle.
The typical workweek then was 60 to 84 hours. (Where did they find the time to strike, right?)
How much longer did it take to get to a 40-hour workweek? About half a century. The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 initially capped the workweek at 44 hours; an amendment two years later brought it down to 40.
So, be patient. Keep pushing for change. Your grandchildren will thank you. Or would, if they did not assume that what they experience as normal had always been the case.