Workers Memorial Day
Workers Memorial Day is held each year on April 28 to mourn workers killed and injured on the job. It is also the day we rededicate ourselves to the fight for workplace safety.
Decades of struggle by workers and their unions have resulted in significant improvements in working conditions. But the fight to protect workers must continue as the toll of workplace injuries, illnesses and deaths remains enormous. Each year, more than 60,000 workers die from job injuries and illnesses, and another 6 million are injured.
Good jobs—jobs that pay decent wages and provide health care benefits and pensions—are disappearing. Corporations are looking to export jobs and cut pay and benefits. Workers are considered more expendable than ever. Worker safety and health protections—rarely a priority for most companies—will be further threatened in a low-wage economy.
Since 1989, trade unionists around the world mark April 28th as an International Day of Mourning. |
April 28th was the date chosen to honor Workers Memorial Day because it is the anniversary of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the day of a similar remembrance in Canada.Workers Memorial Day is a day in which we call for an end to such an injustice, and rededicate ourselves to the fight to make workplaces safer and to make our community stronger.
On April 28, please take the time to mourn the victims and recognize that millions of U.S. workers continue to work in pain and lose their livelihoods because of work-related injuries. It is time President Bush and members of Congress take action to protect workers.
Across the Country | |
My name is Steve Sturges, a member of UFCW Local 222. I've been an ergonomics monitor in the Tyson Foods beef plant in Dakota City Nebraska (the old IBP plant) since the program started in 1988. Back then it was the union and OSHA that got us the program. OSHA wouldn't do it today. We need a new OSHA! | CHANGE TO WIN TESTIFIES BEFORE CONGRESS ON DANGEROUS PATTERNS OF ABUSE UFCW member Doris Morrow [above] testified as witnesses at a Senate hearing to address the dangerous pattern of large corporations ignoring or avoiding their obligations to insure a safe workplace. |
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