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According to a Baltic Research survey commissioned by the ELTA news agency in January, the evaluation of this initiative differed the most among groups of respondents of different ages. The initiative to declare Labor Day January 13 as the most common was supported by young people under the age of 30 (supported by 65%). However, people over 50 rarely expressed support for such an initiative (36% would support it).
This initiative was also more often opposed by respondents with higher education, higher household incomes, managers, professionals and civil servants, retirees, residents of district centers and smaller cities.
The initiative to declare Labor Day on January 13 is not new
As the thirtieth anniversary of Freedom Defenders Day approached, the Seimas adopted a resolution proposed by Seimas member Emanuel Zingeris dedicated to this anniversary, emphasizing that it would be appropriate to declare Defenders of Freedom Day. Freedom as a day of unemployment. However, the initiative to declare Unemployment Day on January 13 had already been taken before.
Conservatives Laurynas Kasčiūnas and Dainius Kreivys also registered the project to declare Freedom Day a day off by entering it into the Labor Code, a similar proposal was made by Algimantas Dumbrava, a member of the Farmers and Greens Union faction of Lithuania, and Dalia Asanavi, a member of the Lithuanian National Christian Democratic Union. President Gitanas Nausėda has also expressed his support for the declaration of January 13 as a non-working day, and the outgoing government has also supported this initiative.
However, the question of declaring January 13 as a non-working day is also evaluated from an economic perspective, since each day has a cost to the state budget. Even before the Seimas elections, the discussions about the possibility of declaring January 13 as a non-working day returned, the representatives of the Lithuanian parliamentary parties did not agree on the day on which the Day of Defenders of Freedom could appear on the non-working list. days.
L. Kasčiūnas, a member of the Lithuanian Christian Democratic-Union of the Seimas Homeland faction, then proposed a classification of the list of holidays: January 13 to be declared an unemployment day and May 1 to be declared a working day . Such a proposal was made, taking into account that the Government estimates that for each additional holiday the state budget does not collect about 50 million. which is detrimental to the country’s economy. However, this proposal was rejected. Gintautas Paluckas, the leader of the Social Democrats at the time, claimed that declaring January 13 as a day off instead of May 1 would be foolish, as this holiday is important all over the world.
Sociologist: Witnesses to the tragic events of January 13 do not want Defenders of Freedom Day to become a day off
At the time, Rasa Ališauskienė, director of Baltic Research, believes that respondents viewed the question of declaring January 13 as Unemployment Day as a historical prism. According to her, the economic factor was only a secondary factor for the survey participants.
“I think the less people think about economics here, they probably think more about the meaning and symbolism of today. Still, those demographics – that is, people who support or disagree with the idea – are highly visible. Still, people over 50 and people with higher education are more dissatisfied, more likely those who witnessed that day, ”noted R. Ališauskienė.
The sociologist points out that a holiday is usually more associated with a holiday for the public, and says that for witnesses of the tragic events of January 13, this date is associated with a painful emotional experience.
“Because this date is tragic, apparently it is for this group of society that remembers these events and participated in them that they think this date is worth mentioning, but certainly not a celebration. Therefore, I believe that this is no longer an economic aspect, but an emotional one, ”said R. Ališauskienė.
“The strongest distinguishing feature in this case is age, because the opinions of men and women are similar, residents of rural, urban and metropolitan areas are not so different either. This in this case is probably a matter of generations. “Is it evaluated through a personal prism, or is it more of an additional historical fact for those who were born later?”, He also emphasized.
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