Labor Day Observed University Holiday: Fill & Download for Free

Here are the recognized federal holidays in the U.S.:New Year’s DayMartin Luther King Jr. DayPresidents Day (or Washington’s Birthday)Memorial DayFourth of JulyLabor DayColumbus Day (which many people want to get rid of or replace with Indigenous People’s Day)Veterans DayThanksgivingChristmas DayAdditionally, individual states have their own public holidays celebrating their heroes or historical events. (Federal and State Holidays 2017 )Only one of these is religious in nature, and that’s Christmas. And Christmas is fairly secularized as it is, with many non-Christians observing aspects of it too (like gifts and a tree). It is almost universally observed in the U.S.Companies with more than 15 employees are required to make “reasonable accommodations” in the event that their employees have religious holidays they wish to observe. So if you’re Muslim and want to celebrate Eid, or Jewish and want to celebrate Yom Kippur, and your company has more than 15 employees, your employer must make a good-faith effort to give you the time off (unless it puts an undue burden on the company). This is the type of thing any bush-league HR department would be familiar with and be able to navigate, for both the employer and the employee. Companies are also expected to treat employees equally here, i.e. you can’t grant a Jewish person’s request for Yom Kippur but deny a Hindu’s request for Diwali.

No holiday is necessary, but some have definite worth, and Labor Day is one of them:First, in the era of over-management of everything from hospitals, Big Pharma, and universities, it is a valuable reminder that it was the age of labor that actually made America great through its railroads, factories, farms, and mines.Second, for North Americans, it is a holiday that, with Memorial Day, frames summer. State Fairs end, kids go back to school, and gasoline prices go down as summer trips to the parks and cottages draw to an end.Third, it is one of the wonderful Monday off holidays that vacation-starved Americans all observe, even those who resisted using their allotted three weeks yet again this year for fear of being replaced.

These are the ten federal holidays: New Year's Day, the Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. (observed on the 3rd Monday of January), Washington's Birthday (universally called Presidents' Day outside of government officialese, observed the third Monday of February), Memorial Day (the last Monday in May), Independence Day (July 4th, but this year observed on July 3rd since July 4th is a Saturday), Labor Day (the first Monday in September), Columbus Day (the second Monday in October), Veterans Day (November 11th), Thanksgiving Day (the fourth Thursday in November), and Christmas (December 25th, obviously.)As a US worker who has spent 20 or so years in the private workforce at a number of jobs, I've never had MLK's birthday, Presidents' Day, Columbus Day, or Veterans Day off from work. That's not to say some, more generous private employers don't give one or more of those days off, but it's not the expected thing. The most direct way in which those "secondary" federal holidays (my term; I've never seen them officially called that anywhere) affect me is that there is no US Mail delivery on those days; in that sense they are "observed" in a noticeable way. Non-essential US government employees have those days off from work and government offices are closed (so, if you lived in the Washington DC area, I'm sure rush-hour traffic is much better on those days; in my part of the country, there's little but perhaps some change). I believe most banks, all privatized in the US, are closed on those days. (I'm not 100% sure, because who goes inside a bank much these days?) So, these days are truly "federal holidays" in the sense that they primarily (though not exclusively) affect the workings of the federal government.New Year's Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas are definitely the "primary" federal holidays. Any professional worker would have them as paid holidays. Banks are definitely closed. No mail delivery of course. Many retail establishments are open on some of those days (there's no federal law about that either way), but very few would be open on New Year's Day, Christmas, or all but a part of the day on Thanksgiving.