Kim Young-sam Quotes

The labour movement had the best opportunity in 50 years to transform not merely an industrial situation and win an important battle for workers in struggle, but an opportunity to change the government of the day.

We want nothing about what is said about abolishing property rights, rather we respect them. But work is the only property of workers, and therefore we want laws to protect the only property of workers, his manpower

The most fervid demand, however, of all the workers on strike was for a shorter day … 10½ hours instead or 13 hours as formerly, or even 14 and 16 reckoning the time of cleaning machinery.

My heart lies with the workers.

Labor: a man coins himself into his labor,—turns his day, his strength, his thought, his affection into some product which remains as the visible sign of his power; and to protect that, to secure that to him, to secure his past self to his future self, is the object of all government. There is no interest in any country so imperative as that of labor; it covers all, and constitutions and governments exist for that,—to protect and insure it to the laborer.

We must defend the rights of working people to bargain collectively for fair wages and safe working conditions.

Each reform, therefore, improving the economical and political situation of the workers proves to be an arm that increases the energy with which the proletarian struggle of classes is fought.

We've always been in favor of improved wages for workers. When you have a strong middle class, they want to buy more stuff at Costco.

The year the bus drivers went on strike in Pittsburgh, I was twenty-three and living on the edge of the city in a neighborhood that was on the verge of becoming a ghetto. I had just been fired from a good job as a cartographer in a design studio where I had worked for about four months.

The more the division of labor and the application of machinery extend, the more does competition extend among the workers, the more do their wages shrink together.

What's going on in this country? Unions stand against those trends. We've got to somehow insulate the robust American economy from this global economy that seems to want to devour our standard of living.

What I remain opposed to is the idea that David Cameron could go around and give up workers' rights, give up environmental protection, give up a whole load of things that are very important.

The clash between capital and labour, between those seeking to maximise profit and those with only their toil to sell, was the driving force for the creation of the trade unions in the 19th century.

Out of the agony and travail of economic America the Committee for Industrial Organization was born.

The backwoodsmen are muttering about making Britain's draconian union laws - already among the toughest in Europe - harsher still. And parts of the media will continue to attack public service pensions, as if school meals staff, refuse collectors and healthcare workers have no right to a decent retirement.

At Leeds the idea of an international labour organization appeared in a trade-union text which also drew attention to the danger to the working classes inherent in the existence of international capitalist competition.

Any reasonable economist will tell you that it's nearly impossible to isolate the impact of right-to-work laws on a state's job growth. A multitude of other factors intervene. However, one thing the numbers can show is that right-to-work laws have a negative effect on the wages of workers in that state.

Our recent 5-year labour agreements, in Canada as well as the United States, are based upon experience, logic and principle rather than on pressure, propaganda and force.

I think there's not much patience for organized labour, period, public or private sector.

Free trade is killing the labor movement.

The labor question is the same the world over, and laborers of the world should clasp hands for their common wealth.

Limitation of the working day to eight hours for all hired workers. ... A complete ban on overtime work. The prohibition of the employment of children of school age.... A ban on the use of female labour in occupations which are harmful to the health of women The provision of nurseries for infants and young children in all ...enterprises employing women. State insurance for workers against old age and partial or complete disability The establishment of properly organized health inspection in all enterprises...free medical services for workers at the employer's expense, with wages to be paid during time of illness

Unions may also legitimately resort to strikes where this is the only available means to the justice owed to workers

Not a penny off the pay. Not a minute on the day.

The union in many cases is reduced to the level of a facilitator, an agent or a "party" in negotiations. As such, how can it be seen by its members to be an organized and dedicated instrument relentlessly pursuing their aspirations and resolutely protecting their wages, conditions and standards?