Labor Day[i] began in the late 19th century as unions formed to fight unfair labor practices and for safe working conditions as result of the industrial revolution in the 19th century[ii]. Labor Day has also been the traditional last day of summer in the US and to me, it always feels like it gets less attention that the holiday that has traditionally kicked off the summer season, Memorial Day. Maybe it’s because the 1,266,742[iii] US Soldiers that have died to defend our liberty from all the wars the US has fought is more of a rare and important task than the 170 million [iv] who show up to work in the US on a day-to-day basis. Maybe it’s because there aren’t Labor Day parades any more like Memorial Day or services honoring those who fought for the 40-hour work week and to make sure kids weren’t getting maimed on industrial machinery like there are for those honored US dead. Maybe it’s because everyone likes beginnings more than endings. Maybe it’s because I’m seeing a lot of places like grocery stores and fast-food joints open regular hours and I know how hard those people are working and need Labor Day off more than me, who used to be a white-collar worker.
The
irony was I too was destined to work on Labor Day this year because I needed a
partial day off on Wednesday Sept 3rd, for a doctor’s appointment and
I had already asked for the Saturday after Labor Day off to volunteer for a
church ministry. So, I felt the least I
could do for my bosses is work emails and text messages related to furniture
purchases or deliveries that were due to take place the day after Labor Day on
September 2nd, 2025, since I was taking some additional time off
this week. Besides, I know most
furniture companies offer big Labor Day sales, like the one I used to work for,
in the hope that people will realize suddenly they’ll need a new couch or guest
bed or dining room table before the holiday season rush. So, while my department was going to be
closed, the stores would be open, and someone had to be there to help
salespeople close sales by adding on deliveries. At least that was supposed to
be the plan.
Until I
was summoned to the Vice President’s office to give me news I knew on the one
hand was coming but also naïvely believed it wasn’t going to involve me. I just got laid off from my job.
As you
may recall from my January 2025 post, I mentioned the previous company I worked
for was going out of business. The
previous company I worked for entered Chapter 11 in September 2024. I believe the downfall of my previous
employer began when the Covid 19 lockdown began in 2020. 2020 was a good year for my old company. Suddenly
the $5k families set aside to go to Walt Disney World they chose to spend on
high-tech home theater sofas with Bluetooth technology allowing a family’s 4K
TV to stream Disney+ directly into the couch’s speakers instead. Then, the pandemic caused massive shortages[v] causing months longs delays in the
aforementioned Bluetooth home theater sofas from arriving from overseas to my
company’s warehouse which didn’t make people happy. The shortages then led to inflation for
everything so suddenly families were struggling to pay for food to place on a
table let alone having money to buy a new table to put food on. Since my previous company’s income was coming
up very short from its expenses, they filed for bankruptcy. You would think I
would work non-stop sending resumés and cover letters to every customer service
opening posted on LinkedIn, Zip Recruiter, Glassdoor, Indeed, etc. as soon as
the bankruptcy was declared but I didn’t.
There
were several reasons why I didn’t push to get a new job as hard as I should
have. My previous company said they
would give a bonus to anyone who would stick around until the bitter end, which
was one factor. The other factor was
prior to the bankruptcy being declared they let several people go and the
bankruptcy created this perfect storm of huge sales/lots of deliveries/lots of
customer calls texts and emails regarding the sales and bankruptcy questions
and fewer workers answering questions, calls, texts, emails etc. I was
used to angry calls before, but let’s just say customers in general have gotten
more belligerent [vi]and
there were plenty of justifiable reasons why those customers were venting their
hostility at me. This meant when I got
home at night or on my days off all I wanted to do was binge-watch YouTube
videos and try and shake off the toxic emotions that were dumped on me during
the previous day or week. I did have
some job interviews, but they went nowhere.
I
learned in March a new company was taking over some of my previous company’s
stores and they offered me a position within that new company. I was
split between working in a customer pickup area and a call center que for this
new furniture company doing the same thing I had done in the previous company I
worked for. Yet forces of the economy
began to work against me and my new position.
When I worked at the pickup center for my
previous company, I remember on a Saturday there would be about 30-40 pickups
of furniture from customers. My
current pickup position averaged about 2-8 pickups for a Saturday and the rest
of the week I was lucky to get one or two.
The pickup center was part of the store that also had the warehouse, so
I interacted with the sales force who saw me more as a local store employee
instead of the corporate employee I was but just happened to be working out of
that specific store office. I didn’t
mind trying to help them resolve the issues they had with their customers since
we are all on the same team. However, I
couldn’t magically make backordered merchandise that was stuck on some cargo
ship either in some port or still making its way from China appear in the
warehouse to prevent a customer from cancelling their sales, if they had one. There
were plenty of days I watched the salespersons sitting on the couches checking
their smartphones with nothing better to do since it was obvious customers knew
it would be better to get some used couch from Facebook groups for less than
what my store was charging for a new one. I should have known this survey that was sent
by the department heads asking me, and everyone else who worked there, to
explain what I did for the company and if there was someone else who worked in
the company that could do the same job I do, they were looking to make staff
reductions. I knew I couldn’t lie
about being the only one who could handle the pickup center, and I knew they
knew I wasn’t the only one who could answer phone calls, emails and texts from
customers, which were becoming fewer and far between. I still felt that because I was doing all
this work, (Pickup, texts, emails, phones, in person customer assistance) and
doing a good job with it they would realize the value I was providing them with
and keep me on. My supervisor liked me,
and I felt confident that I would be staying on.
However,
the reason why the Vice President of the company I recently worked for was
telling me personally they let me go, is because they let my supervisor go as
well.
Now I’m
facing a scary time in this country to go job hunting and a scary time for me
personally. The jobs report was bad in
July[vii] which
caused President Trump to fire the commissioner of labor statistics Erika
McEntarfer[viii]
because he didn’t like what he saw. Laura Olrich, who is the Director of
economic research at job website Indeed.com stated that job postings on
Indeed.com have declined by 6.7% year of year to CBS Sunday Morning tech
correspondent David Pouge, who also said AI could eliminate my field of
customer service. Then again, I had a
cousin who suggested that maybe I could get an AI support job such as fixing
mistakes from AI generated transcripts.
My cousin teaches nursing at a local college, and she complained when
some AI bot takes down her lecture notes it often mistranslates medical words
like bilirubin, a yellowish substance that if there is too much of in the body
can be a sign of liver dysfunction, into the names Billy Reuben.
In a way I feel as though I have lost part of my identity. When one meets a stranger after asking for their name, (so they are no longer strangers), we often ask what they do for a living. I'm not sure what to say anymore. The Catholic church teaches “It is clear from the very first pages of the Bible that work is an essential part of human dignity”[ix] and then goes on to tell how in Genesis God set Adam to work right away naming all the animals on earth and tending to the Garden of Eden. The Catholic Church goes on to explain: “Labor also makes possible the development of society and provides for the sustenance, stability and fruitfulness of one’s family: ‘
Which is
true. Jeff Bezos would not be the $241
billionaire he is [x] without
the hard work of Amazon’s 1.5 million employees and in some ways Amazon has
made the world a better place because of the work of it’s 1.5 million
employees. It’s also true that
sometimes the human touch and the human need to interact with each other will
always be more valuable than some pre-generated AI information since we humans
know deep down how vulnerable we have been since we were kicked out that that
Garden of Eden and how we’ve been struggling ever since then.
I just
know right now I’m feeling particularly vulnerable since I don’t know if this
world still cares about the hard work of human beings who want to try and
resolve issues and make the world a little bit of a better place like I used to.
[iii] number
of us soldiers who died in the revolutionary war - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in the war of 1812 - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in the war of Mexican American war - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in the civil war - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in World War I - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in World War II - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in korean war - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in vietnam war - Search plus number
of us soldiers who died in Desert Storm - Search plus https://www.bing.com/search?q=number+of+us+soldiers+who+died+in+afghanistan+war&qs=GS&pq=number+of+us+soldiers+who+died+in+afgh&sk=GS1&sc=12-38&cvid=769B7419E977411991C548BD34458
plus number
of us soldiers who died in Iraq war - Search
