EDITORIAL - Sometimes stomach logic works better

Records at the labor department showed that since January, there have been no strikes and related labor problems in Central Visayas. And while it is difficult to expect the same for the rest of the year, no real big problems are anticipated either.

To be sure, the records can be misleading. The absence of any labor problem in the region for the first quarter can hardly be taken to mean that the labor sector has suddenly become quite a contented lot.

Our guess is that things are even far from it. We believe what is keeping any restiveness in check in the labor sector is that workers simply cannot afford any disruptions at this time in their capacity to earn a living.

Times are hard. There is no doubt about it. If even those who have the means to tide any crisis over are beginning to feel the pinch, then more so those who are in the fringes of the economic spectrum.

Sometimes the stomach can come up with a better logic than the brain. Thus, even if there are clear instances when the unscrupulous take advantage of the crying need to hold on to jobs, the pragmatists know nothing is really lost if righteous idealism is set aside for a while.

There is a time for everything. At a time when great sacrifices have to be made, workers make up the frontline of those willing to bear the most burden on their backs. Those who toil, toil for a purpose, more often for family.

To many workers, tomorrow is another day. Today there has to be bread on the table or his family don't eat. This is the desperation that is responsible for industrial peace. When times get better, only then will workers indulge in the luxury of better rights.

There is, however, also another reason why there is relative peace in the labor front. But his reason is rooted more in ideological direction that in any intellectual inspiration born of survival logic.

The usual troublemakers and agitators are busy elsewhere. From whichever part of the woodwork they crawl from, they seem to have converged on the doorstep of political power. They think they have their quarry cornered. With no agitators, labor and peace can co-exist.