There hasn’t been so much activity in the labor movement as four big unions under the panoply of AFL-CIO are now dissolving their relationship. Unionism is in disarray, perhaps because of some successes. Contributions of laborers have been muted because they have been persuaded that the accumulation of money without work is better than a job and benefits. This has monopolized the thinking of both parties; much less the silent moribund Socialist cells that still remain in this country.

I declared my interest in, belief in but not membership in, Socialism.  I think it is the most democratic of systems where wealth is not allowed to pool within a small group of undeserving “stirpes” who profit by being born into wealth they did not earn.  I believe, and I have said this with pride many times, that work is good and good for you.  I still feel guilty when I am waited on by someone who works at something that I could do for myself.  I consider an active life long after I ceased to “labor” as a professor in a university as important. I also see that as I grow older, my age is made into a disability rather than as a desired plateau where consideration is just below reverence.  I have always insisted that when I went to work for Monmouth that I had retired; the teaching schedule was so light compared to the high school classes I taught before. While involved in the academic world I built things in the home I acquired, built and performed with puppets and helped found, lead and write for the first Private College Teacher’s Union, (FAMCO) that the NLRB accepted under its authority.

I believe that work is a way of life.  We must occupy our time with doing something and, I hope, that something is worthy and will do no harm to others.  Millions upon millions of people are looking for work, but many are persuaded that work done by hand labor is beneath their dignity.  Everyone wants to be in an executive capacity and become a millionaire (in these inflated times, read billionaire) without working for it.  Today in Florida the source of immense wealth is the turnover of real estate.  Everyone wants to buy low and sell high.  That is fine with me for it worked when I became a home-owner – but the mania is such that people often buy land under water without noticing that fact.

Work is good and it should be a way of life with children being taught that when they grow up there should be a union waiting for them to join and speak for them. We have a monolithic government controlled by a heartless party.  Workers of the world unite; your leaders enrich themselves at your expense.