16 October in the US is an unofficial “Boss’s Day” to celebrate and thank bosses. Apparently there are Hallmark cards and everything.
My response to this echoes a common sentiment some of you may have bumped into. When a child asks “If there’s a Mother’s Day and a Father’s Day, why isn’t there a Children’s Day?” parents in unison answer, “Because every day is Children’s Day!”
Why is there a Labour Day but not an official statutory Boss’s Day? Because every day is Boss’s Day.
Side note: the word “boss” comes from the Dutch “baas,” meaning “master.”
And my employees got me…absolutely nothing!
Being a boss is a thankless job… but it pays better than being an underling.
No, not always. During the darkest days of COVID I wasn’t making a dime, but my employees still got their paychecks.
In large organizations, your boss may just be a cog in a larger wheel. Middle managers who take good care of their employees definitely deserve appreciation, even if ______ Day stuff is pretty performative across the board.
Bertie Russell had some interesting thoughts in his 1932 essay, “In Praise of Idleness,” including "Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first kind is unpleasant and ill paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid. The second kind is capable of indefinite extension: there are not only those who give orders but those who give advice as to what orders should be given.
In Praise of Idleness, by Bertrand Russell
An official “make a fuss over your boss” day kind of puts the onus on employees to do something or otherwise look bad. No thanks! I like it the way it is.
I never observed Boss’s Day when I still had a boss. There’s something about creating an expectation for a lower-paid employee to give gifts to the person who does their evaluation that just strikes me as wrong.
During the pandemic, my husband and his partners went without pay a couple of times so that their employees could be paid. But they were the people who could afford to skip a paycheck or two, and their overall compensation more than makes up for it. They don’t need balloons and cards on top of it.
Did you own the business, or were managers not being paid?
Owner of a small business.
Then it was your choice not to take an owner’s draw during COVID. Were your employees still working, or were they home not working?
I agree with this. It’s institutionalized butt-snorkeling. Reminds of of the scene in Office Space with the birthday cake - everyone is supposed to sing for Lumbergh’s birthday, no matter how they feel about the guy. Boss Day is one of the more cultish things about today’s work environment, akin to the whole “Dear Leader” thing in N Korea.
Yet, I will go along with it, just like everyone else, and sign his damn e-card.
??My choice. There wasn’t money there to be taken. The business was open, required masking, and people weren’t coming in to spend money. I needed employees present for the few customers venturing out and I paid out more in salaries than I took in.
My boss can go to hell. Today, and any other day.
Japan has just entered the chat
Not to be confused with Putting Things on Top of Other Things.
You guys realize it’s only October 12, right? And Bosses Day isn’t until Monday? 
So plenty of time to get those cards and presents for your boss! And plan to work unpaid overtime to really show appreciation. You can even make your own cards. Mine will have this verse from “Solidarity Forever”:
“All the world that’s owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone.
We have laid the wide foundations; built it skyward stone by stone.
It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own.
When the union makes us strong.”
OMG, I am so glad I am no longer at the job where I was working for the nasty boss. New job starts Monday.
Someone called?
From the article
It was traditionally Boys’ Day and while there has also been a Girls’ Day, or Hinamatsuri
Children’s Day is a national holiday while Girls’ Day is not.