A strong, principled labor movement is only part of what we need to make sure that all people are viewed as essential, irreplaceable, and inherently valuable. Workers should not be valued because of what they produce, how many people they might save, how “essential” their job is, or how much money their work contributes to the economy. Workers should be valued because they are people with an unrestrained ton of human rights. In that vein, people who don’t work deserve a life that is just as high-quality.
The systems that reward workers forced to risk their lives in return for one-time bonuses or special “hero” commercials (meant only to sell more stuff) are the same systems that exclude agricultural, domestic, and gig workers from labor protections, advocate for “right to work” laws, take away collective bargaining rights from public employees, make it difficult to ever hold a union election, and hire union-busting firms to scare workers out of using their right to collective representation. These systems do not care what happens to us as long as they keep making money.
A few phrases I have heard a lot in the past few months are “especially now” and “in light of COVID-19” and “in these unprecedented times,” followed by a condemnation of some unfair or unsafe situation. It makes me wonder whether people would have cared about that same situation had it not been for COVID. As defeatist as it may sound, Black, brown, low-paid, unprotected workers were always going to bear the brunt of COVID-19. Our society was already sacrificing them first, at work and otherwise. To me, that’s why a strong, worker-led, liberatory labor movement is so important. When I say liberatory, I mean that we should create the world we want within our labor movement, and that this labor movement should actively dismantle the systems of oppression that hold workers -- and non-workers—down. If the labor movement doesn’t fight especially for LGBTQ+, disabled, undocumented, and Black workers, then it won't be enough. Similarly, a labor movement that accepts incomprehensible wealth gaps and doesn't act to change our economic system (which I believe workers do, every time they demand control over the workplace) will not be doing all it can to fight for workers.