Take this job and shove it

Nearly 3 percent of the American workforce quit a job in August, according to the Department of Labor. That mounts to 4.3 million people.

That seems like a scary number, though the report does not get into how many of those people immediately took a new job. If most simply shifted employers, not to worry. But if many of folks simply left the workforce, too stressed and depressed to continue a crappy job... that is cause for concern.

My comfort is that if we can take a long view, all this labor shuffling has to work itself out. After all, everyone needs some amount of income to live, and employers say they have millions of jobs available but can't find applicants.

So eventually we should be able to look back at the pandemic and all its associated challenges, including employment issues, and realize that it takes a couple years for an economy to kick back into gear after an abrupt shutdown. I'm sure the U.S. is not alone in this situation.

Taking the long view is not something most of us are very good at, of course. I'm certainly not. I'm more concerned with the recent surge of flight cancellations and delays by Southwest Airlines and whether the job actions (sick outs) or whatever caused the mess get worked out by Thursday at 8 a.m.

We are booked to fly to southern California for a family celebration and people are coming from Portland, Seattle, and Denver for the fun. 

I didn't want the 8 a.m. flight, booking one at 11 a.m. originally. But that flight was cancelled and we were assigned the much earlier departure time. As a consumer, I was at the mercy of the airline. I'm sure the airline was acting in its self-interest, as all large corporations do. I am not happy about the change but it's out of my hands. 

I have seen the effects of too-few workers, from slow service at restaurants to shops closing a couple days a week to (maybe) the Southwest employee unions slowing flights due to arguing about -- according to reports -- how pilots will be treated should they feel ill after receiving a vaccination for Covid. 

Here's my (not) radical idea: assure everyone that they will receive extra sick leave should they need it. Also we might assure everyone that we are all interested in ending the pandemic and that pilots -- people we trust our lives somewhat blindly to -- are not anti-science.

Flying a thousand miles only seems like magic.