Workers Memorial Day

I should know better than to read the comments on anything

I wasted a fair amount of time today wading into the stupid on the Intertubes. One of the major news stories and ongoing themes on Facebook and in the blogosphere was the nation-wide fast food workers strike. The stupid, it runs deep. I'm lucky I didn't drown.

There are two major refrains that always run through any discussion of upping wages for the folks doing the scut work for society. The first comes from employers whining that it will mean raising prices and that's going to kill business. Here's a news flash for all you McDonald's/Subway/Burger King franchise owners: if the minimum wage goes up, it doesn't just go up for your store alone -- it goes up for everyone. The playing field is still level.

The second piece of stupidity that gets repeated ad nauseum is that all those people doing the scut work are just too damn lazy or uneducated to look for something better. What the minimum wage burger flippers need to do is get an education and improve themselves. Ditto the underpaid hotel maids and nurse aides and a whole lot of other people who work at the dirty jobs that keep this country running. I want to know what planet those people who spout that line live on -- have they bothered to look at the American economy lately? It's a service economy. Where are jobs being created? In retail and in health care, i.e., sales clerks and home health aides. No one needs a college education to qualify to run a cash register at Dollar General or to help old ladies take showers. Yes, it's great if you can get an education and find work as a software engineer or an investment banker, but there's a limited number of those jobs to go around. The reality is that there are a lot of over-educated people flipping burgers or changing diapers.

On the other hand, the fact that you don't need an advanced degree to make change or help old people bathe doesn't mean you don't deserve to be paid a living wage. Regardless of the job, if you put in a full day's labor, you should receive enough pay to live on. I can remember a time when that wasn't such a hard concept to understand. Apparently those days are long gone.

Is it still Vappu if there is no bonfire?

Last year we didn't do a May Day bonfire because conditions were too dry. This year there's no bonfire because the snow in the field is still more than knee deep and we don't feel like wading through it an attempt to torch a pile of sodden spruce boughs. Besides, how can it be May when snow is predicted for tomorrow?

It's been an odd year. Time is out of joint. January felt like it should be April, and now May feels like March. Last May everyone was worrying about wildfires; this year we all wanted the snow to be gone but now are worrying about what happens as it melts. The U.P. is thoroughly saturated, the CN tracks near our place have been underwater for a couple days, and a long section of state highway M-28 is closed because the Middle Branch of the Ontonagon decided to flow over a bridge instead of under it.

Not that this year is really that unusual. Last year was the aberration. This year is typical. I can recall that in my younger days (as in elementary school age) I used to wonder about a tradition I'd read about: May Day baskets. Ditto dancing around a May pole with flowers on one's head. I always wondered just where people got the flowers for the baskets and garlands I saw pictured because all I ever saw outside on May Day were melting snowbanks, mud, and once in a great while (if it was a particularly early Spring) a few crocuses.

Two more days until my birthday, and it's still looking like I'll be able to do some cross county skiing -- at least as long as I stick to the high ground.

[Actually, from what I hear, it's not truly a traditional Vappu unless there a  few drunks pissing on lamp posts, but this isn't Helsinki so we're out of luck in that department.]