Episode 105 What The 'Bloody Harlan' Strike Continues to Reveal About America's Workers
The Harlan coal strike of the 1930’s became the model for company oppression and American labor uprising. Except it keeps happening…and not all the miners were American.
Anthony Bourdain once wrote “No one understands and appreciates the American Dream of hard work leading to material rewards better than a non-American.”
So that’s our subject for today’s episode. We’re talking about hard work, grit, and the American work ethic. Have we gotten weaker over the years? Less tough? More soft as American workers? Or are we churning out more butter and coal than our tough-as-nails grandfathers could have ever imagined?
We also explore why immigrants have always been the cornerstone of our labor force, and how they were ironically the stone-cutters who cut our cornerstones too. Then we’ll also play the hypothetical game of ‘Who’s the hardest worker?’ when comparing generations in regards to international productivity, and how work has evolved away from the fields. Then we’ll take a moment to clap back at the Navy (and managers in general) who think telling you the work isn’t all that tough should justify soul-crushing hours.
Finally, we’ll take a look at how the miners of Appalachia resolved the strike. And why it wasn’t corporate generosity that got them out from under the yoke of mining barons - but good ol’ fashioned word-of-mouth and legal recourse.
History Notes:
https://www.appalachianhistory.net/2017/02/we-need-certain-class-o-people-workin.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlan_County_War
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074605/
Science Notes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jxVa0QenlE https://hbr.org/1988/01/no-nonsense-guide-to-measuring-productivity
https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/in-america-immigrants-really-do-get-the-job-done https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/immigrants-outperform-native-born-americans-two-key-measures-financial-success-n1020291