The Dignity of Labor. The Indignity of Laboring.

I find it pretty interesting that the people who are most likely to crow about the dignity of labor, and the redemptive qualities of hard work are generally those least likely to do any real hard labor. Garrison Keillor showed up in Salon in an online essay last week. In his essay Mr. Keillor touted the positives of labor and earning a paycheck. He actually calls it redemptive. I daresay if you talked to any of millions of individuals in America who draw a small paycheck from doing mind-numbing, hard physical labor they would be glad for the paycheck, but would label the actual work anything but redemptive.

To his credit, Mr. Keillor did suggest that America needs a jobs program, such as the Depression Era works projects, the WPA for instance. We do need something that will put millions of Americans back to work. Unfortunately, well-heeled Republicans oppose such a program en-masse. They say we can't afford it. It would either cause a rise in taxes or it would cause the national debt to grow even larger. Gotta wonder where these clowns were when G.W. Bush and company were putting two major wars on the buy now pay later plan.

At any rate, more jobs for Americans, doing things that are good for the infrastructure, is a good idea. It would fix a crumbling infrastructure that no one seems willing to pay to fix. It would provide jobs for unemployed Americans. Those now employed Americans would then go out and spend money, thus creating jobs for more Americans, and fewer Americans would find themselves facing foreclosure on their mortgages. Still, very few of them would describe their labors as redemptive. Paychecks redemptive. Labor not so much.

Mr. Keillor went on to talk about how he briefly held a job, in high school where he fed dishes into a dishwasher. Oooohhh, the hardship. Did he have to wash them by hand? Did he have to continue doing this job everafter so he could pay the bills? Not! Mr. Keillor has lived a life writing for newspapers and magazines, with the odd book thrown in, while hosting a nationally syndicated radio show. Not a lot of hard redemptive labor there.

At one point Mr. Keillor pointed out that he could have chosen to make a career out of manure spreading, but did not. The key word here is choice. There are those out there who have no choice but to take on that career in manure spreading, and anyone who calls that sort of labor redemptive is a lunatic. I graduated with a liberal arts degree in 1972 and spent a large part of that decade doing manual labor. I did not find anything about it redemptive or dignified. I found eating somewhat rewarding, however, so I continued to engage in such activities until something better came along.

There is a certain Republican anti-handout mantra that goes something like, "People feel better about themselves if they know they earn a living and don't have it given to them as a handout." People feel even better about themselves if the size of the paycheck will keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. Frankly, if handouts are larger than what you get when you are actually laboring at a job, I doubt anyone finds themselves feeling good about earning a living instead of taking a handout.

Frankly, if America were so taken with the dignity of labor and its redemptive qualities, the lottery would not be such a boom industry. We've all heard the comments from lottery winners who say they won't change a thing about their lives. Then they proceed to quit their jobs, buy a big car and a big house, and live like the millionaires they've become. Redemptive schmemptive, people work because they have to. If labor were so redemptive, we'd find Rockefellers paving roads and building bridges. If labor were so dignified and redemptive, there would be no Paris Hiltons and her ilk filling the pages of the "Who did what to whom and with whom" columns.

That being said, I begrudge no one who doesn't have to work and thus doesn't. I often find myself being a wee bit jealous of these people. If I didn't have to work, I probably wouldn't. Then I could find time to do things that I really like doing, like writing and reading, and playing tennis and running, and traveling, and singing and playing my guitar. If I were able to make a living doing any of those things, I might find that redemptive. Just don't try to hand me a load of b.s. about the redemptive quality of the sweat of your brow and the dignity of callouses on your hands. Been there. I know better. I am not owned by the job. My job does not define who I am. Nor does it for the millions upon millions of men and women who work a great deal harder than I do every day. So let's all celebrate paychecks, instead. They make life possible, even if coming by them is a real bitch.