Machinists Stand Firm in Eight-Hour Struggle
Striking workers across the Pacific Coast remain resilient against employer efforts to maintain the ten-hour workday.
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Organizer Lane of the Machinists' union visited Everett Wednesday to attend the local union meeting. He reports optimistically on the eight-hour day strike, noting that while many shop owners would gladly grant the demand, they are pressured by the metal trades' employers' association. Lane states that the lack of skilled replacements arriving from the East is ruining the employers' plans. Strikers are standing firm, receiving benefits, and avoiding internal dissension. Recent gains include twelve shops in Los Angeles, nearly all shops in Stockton, and various shops in Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, and Tacoma. Despite employer arguments that the eight-hour day means financial ruin, the union maintains that increased worker efficiency refutes these claims. Locally, the situation remains strong with no defections among the strikers.
“The experience of every industry in the country that has adopted the shorter workday rises up to refute the calamity howl of the employers.”
Everett has a long, gritty history of labor organization, and the struggle for the eight-hour day was a fundamental clash over who controls the value of human time. Today's debates over gig economy labor rights and remote work boundaries echo these same century-old tensions between industrial efficiency and the quality of life.
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