Labor Day marks the end of the summer holidays in the USA, but what exactly is it celebrated and why?

The reason has nothing to do with summer itself.

What you should know:

When is Labor Day celebrated?

The federal holiday is celebrated every year on the first Monday in September.

In 2024, this day falls on September 2nd.

Why is Labor Day a holiday?

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, Labor Day is a celebration of the social and economic achievements of American workers. President Grover Cleveland signed a law making it a national holiday on June 28, 1894, although its history stretches years earlier.

The first Labor Day was celebrated more than a decade earlier – when about 10,000 workers marched in New York City on September 5, 1882, according to the plans of the Central Labor Union.

The quality of life of workers worsened as they moved from craft to factory, while the quality of life of factory owners “skyrocketed,” Todd Vachon, assistant professor at the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations, previously explained.

In the years that followed, some cities and states began to pass laws recognizing Labor Day. Oregon was the first state to pass a law recognizing it as a holiday in 1887.

That same year, workers at the Pullman Palace Car Company went on strike after the car maker cut wages without lowering rent in the company-owned town near Chicago where the workers lived, Vachon said.

More than 12 workers were killed after Cleveland sent federal troops to break up the strike, he said. Cleveland’s decision to establish Labor Day as a federal holiday is seen by some historians as a way to make “peace” with the working class, Vachon said.

When Labor Day became a federal holiday in 1894, unions were widely controversial in the U.S. and courts often declared strikes illegal, leading to violent confrontations, Vachon says. It wasn’t until the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 that private sector workers were given the right to join unions.

In recent years there has been a revival of union organizing, activism, interest and support, Vachon said.

“Many of the millennials and Generation Z are entering the job market at a time that is not much different from the 1880s, when there was a lot of labor unrest,” Vachon said. “The jobs just don’t pay enough to achieve the American dream.”