Samuel Gompers Quotes
So long as there is one [person] who seeks employment and cannot find it, the hours of work are too long.
Gompers, Samuel. "The Eight-Hour Workday." The American Federationist, vol. 4, no. 2, Apr. 1897, p. 31.
At the time there was great demand for skilled computer programmers and other technical skills. But there was insufficient demand for many of the skills that the American Workforce such as airplane mechanics, or TV Camera people for example.
Well over a century ago, this prescient economist pointed out that in a very competitive economy, people would have to develop and have multiple skills to remain employable. The competition also produces technological obsolescence.
There has been no other candidate for President who ever made a statement like this. Other candidates typically promise to work hard at a facet of the presidency, or claim that their background or experience will make them very qualified, and many quote others as to their likely success. Trump's authority is Trump. And he assures us that God never created any other president as great as he would be in the area of growing the economy and creating jobs.
The nation was divided over the issue of immigration. Many observed that the vast majority of the immigrants—especially the illegal immigrants performed jobs for which American workers could not be hired. Opponents like the congressman, claimed that if better wages were paid Americans would be doing the jobs, and as long as there were immigrants who would work for low wages, there was little reason for employers to pay more.
Samuel Gompers was a British-born American cigar maker, labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL), and served as the organization's president from 1886 to 1894, and from 1895 until his death in 1924. He promoted harmony among the different craft unions that comprised the AFL, trying to minimize jurisdictional battles. He promoted through organization and collective bargaining, to secure shorter hours and higher wages, the first essential steps, he believed, to emancipating labor. He also encouraged the AFL to take political action to "elect their friends" and "defeat their enemies". He mostly supported Democrats, but sometimes Republicans. He strongly opposed Socialists. During World War I, Gompers and the AFL openly supported the war effort, attempting to avert strikes and boost morale while raising wage rates and expanding membership.
