[General] Labor's day or labor day?

[gugugo]

Which phrase is correct Labor's day or Labor day?

 

[Gillnetter]

Labor Day

 

[gugugo]

I have seen these phrases used in several texts on the internet but I don't why I should use one or the other.

 

[BobK]

Here's why: Labor Day isn't possessed by Labour (incidentally, that Wikipedia article begins by saying 'Labor Day is an American federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September'. Given the date of your post, I imagine you're asking about the European version, known in the UK as 'Labour Day' - in early May).

It's a day marked to celebrate the power/nobility/worthiness/solidarity ... of Labour.

b

 

[BobK]

I shouldn't have said just 'European'. There are Labour Days all over the world. ;-)

b

 

[gugugo]

Should I say: In Panama we celebrate Labor day on May 1st, or In Panama we celebrate Labor's day on May 1st ?

 

[SoothingDave]

Should I say: In Panama we celebrate Labor day on May 1st, or In Panama we celebrate Labor's day on May 1st ?

Asked and answered. Read post #2.

 

[gugugo]

I wonder why the other option is wrong.

 

[Barb_D]

Because we don't say it that way.

 

[MikeNewYork]

It is not a possessive.

 

[Barb_D]

We have Mothers' Day to honor mothers, and Fathers' Day to honor fathers, and Veterans' Day to honor veterans. Yet with Labor Day, which honors those who labor, we have no apostrophe.

 

[BobK]

Because we don't say it that way.

:up: A good argument, but I'm afraid some students don't find it persuasive. ;-)

It is not a possessive.

:up: Some time in the seventies, when Harold Wilson (Labour) was Prime Minister, there was a political kerfuffle about a change from 'Whit Monday' (a Church occasion and a Bank Holiday) to 'the early Spring Bank Holiday' (the first Monday in May). Opponents of the change argued (foolishly) that this change was a veiled recognition of an occasion that somehow belonged to the Labour Party.

b

 

[Barb_D]

I know people don't find it persuasive, but that's what "that's the idiomatic way to say it" comes down to. There is not a lot of logic in the way we handle these things. Generally, when one noun modifies another, we use the plain noun. Yet it's Veterans' Day. (Even less logically, many official sites have it has "Veteran's Day, as if there were only one.)

 

[konungursvia]

I wonder why the other option is wrong.

Could it be because Labor is an abstract noun, whereas mother is a person? I mean, Laborers' Day would work, if it wasn't so hard to say and write.