Business News and Information

Today is Labor Day, a day to honor the work of the everyman laborer and rest. Truth be told, I don’t see many people honoring laborers today.

What I do see is people relishing the three-day weekend, some may have played hooky last Friday and made it a mini-holiday. I see smoke from from backyard grills, increased police patrols, movie theaters with ridiculously long lines, and that my local grocer’s beer case is nearly empty.

Sometimes our holidays are little more than a good excuse to indulge in excess. Over the weekend “Drunk Driving: Over the Limit, Under Arrest,” a nationwide campaign to target and reduce drunk driving, was implemented.

According to Stop Impaired Driving, in 28% of all fatal motorcycles accidents the cyclist had a BAC of .08 or higher.

To deter holiday revelers from driving under the influence law enforcement officials are stepping up their visibility, increasing the number of officers on the street and setting up sobriety checkpoints. 

But drunk driving prosecutions aren’t the only thing on the rise today. A dismal heat wave is stretching the relief of ceiling and portable fans to their limit, forcing many of us to head for that air-conditioned heaven known as the movie theater. 

Record heat helped create a record braking weekend for Hollywood this Labor Day, enjoying a 22% spike in ticket sales this weekend compared to the 2006 summer box office.

Maybe tonight, after we’ve depleted our kidney’s reserves with cold beer, added a few inches to our waistlines with buttery popcorn, and grudgingly headed to our overheated homes to plot in front of the television or computer, we’ll take a moment to appreciate the sacrifices of the men and women who unloaded those appliances from the container ships at the docks, cleaned up our spilled soda as we left the theater, and stock the cases at the store.