The great pain of the workers that John Lennon describes in the song he composed is that felt by the workers in the United States of America in the 19th century, where the law that imposed a maximum working time of 8 hours in 1868 was not respected. .up to date. For this purpose, on May 1, 1886, Chicago workers declared a strike.

In 1891, before the rise of revolutionary ideas, the Pope issued the encyclical Rerum novarum, which favored the creation of trade unions: “Time has surrendered the workers, isolated and helpless, to the inhumanity of the employers.” The Pope urged them not to consider the worker a slave, to respect his dignity. “Every worker must be paid a living wage and a reasonably comfortable life.”

Almost a century and a half after the Chicago massacre, despite multiple and important labor conquests, there is a whole field to cover in Ecuador and even more, given the anachronistic winds blowing, to defend what they have, as has happened since the Law of work issued, and they must return what was removed.

The employment relationship is simulated; workers are forced to sign repeated contracts – which also happens in the public sphere – of which they are not given a copy; they are not related to IESS or are related to values ​​lower than the received compensation; pregnant women are a nuisance. The Law on Humanitarian Support to the COVID-19 Pandemic established a new special contract for exceptional cases, which establishes a defined deadline, without an order that the exception be qualified by the Ministry of Labour, which was widely used by employers. leaving aside the indefinite period prescribed by the code and trying against the stability that benefits both parties. In this way, it could be engaged to fill 427,009 unemployed persons in the period from March 15 to October 1, 2020, among which about 25,780 are due to force majeure, which is no longer the case since the ruling of the Constitutional Court. protection to have the meager payments they received reviewed in court.

One day there will be a society where everyone will be workers, without some commanding and others obeying.

The executive branch, defending the interests of the sector it represents, tried to create a parallel labor law, which seriously violates the rights of workers provided for by the law. The presidential project used abundant inadequate employment as a reason, but it is worth remembering what Rerum novarum says: “If a worker accepts bad working conditions out of necessity or fear, he is a victim of injustice.”

The workers, for their part, must act honestly and efficiently, overcome individualism, engage in political struggles to really change their situation, elect honest leaders.

One day there will be a society where everyone will be workers, without some commanding and others obeying. A society with a humane distribution of resources, as proclaimed by Pope Francis, the successor of Assisi. “A working-class hero is something to be”: Lennon. (OR)