Dr John Razu
May Day signifies the celebration of the hard-fought struggles and success stories of the workers of the world over centuries. Right from long hours of work to poor wages and unsafe working conditions and host of others prompted the workers to come together to fight for their cause in unison. Labor plays the most prominent role in the production processes. Without labor nothing gets transformed. Labour is the concomitant principle of human activity and existence.
Labor is the only facet that totally transforms everything be it a barren land or a log of wood or what not, name it. Laborers are the nerve-center of any society to subsist and to move on from one phase to another. Right from production-to-distribution-to-consumption processes the toil of the working classes is very much involved. On the other side, those who control capital say that they have the capital and so they have right to decide how much to pay and how much work the laborers have to contribute in return of their labor.
The antagonism between capitalists and the laborers continues because of the fact that on the one hand the capitalists prosper in absolute terms, while on the other the workers live in appalling conditions. The arguments that we hear is: The ways and means the capitalists grow and accumulate property are by way of exploiting the laborers through unpaid labor that adds to surplus--profits. This is why the labor movements and the labor unions continue to struggle in favor of the workers demanding better wages and safe working conditions.
At the same time the capitalists who tend to upgrade the modes of production in order to make the human labor redundant. After the dawn of globalization, the working-class movement had to suffer a major setback due to stringent labor policies and highly controlled regulation for the trade union activities. In addition, technology too contributed immensely as the world is moving towards robotization and technologization.
One of the basic tenets of capitalism is innovation, and so, the big corporations that controls natural and human resources spends huge sums of money towards research and development (R&D). The world is moving towards creating AI and robots so that the human labor could become redundant. The world is moving towards an era of robotization. The work force both in the formal and informal sectors have been contributing to the growth, progress and welfare of the societies and enhancing the GDP and GNP. They are the life-line of any society without whom the societies cannot and shall not move on.
Workers by and large throughout the world suffer due to various reasons. They are paid less wages and subject to exploitation. The current world being controlled by crony capitalists want to extract the maximum from the laboring classes and thus keep them in pathetic conditions. Labor for want of jobs migrates within and between the borders. The only aim of those who migrate to satiate hunger and to save little bit to be sent to their families distantly living. The service and infrastructure sectors such as roads laying, housing and other development projects such as telecommunications that the public and private sectors need them.
In search of jobs the semi-skilled and unskilled migrate to far distances leaving their families and domiciles. Knowing their plight, the crony capitalists bargain their wages and to the maximum exploit them. The treatment meted out by them is worse and almost be called as ‘modern slavery’. Capitalism employs diverse forms of exploitation to extract labor to maximize profit. Maximization of profits is the core of capitalism and this could be possible through labor exploitation. Most of the work force is in the unorganized sector and do not come under unions.
May Day rekindles and reinstates the importance and significance of labor which is indeed the concomitant principle of human activity. Those who contribute to the welfare of societies are treated as objects and means of exploitation. Without jobs they live in abject poverty and live in squalid conditions. Agricultural and industrial labor across the world continues to face all sorts of humiliation and desperation. Without labor the societies and nations become static. We should recognize the fact that they are the subjects of history and so LONG LIVE LABOR.
