Announcing Steal Something from Work Day 2017!

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Frequently Asked Questions about Our Yearly Day of Action

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This coming Saturday, April 15, is Steal Something from Work Day, a worldwide holiday scheduled to coincide with Tax Day. If you’re wondering why you should give your hard earned wages to an erratic billionaire so he can pay for more bureaucrats to spy on you and police to hassle you, consider where billionaires like Donald Trump get their fortunes in the first place—they skim profits off the hard work of ordinary people like you. That’s where Steal Something from Work Day comes in: don’t let them puff themselves up at your expense!

At this point, Steal Something from Work Day is a time-honored tradition. Even Haaretz is covering it this year. Tax Day 2017 has been pushed back to April 18, but Steal Something from Work Day still falls on the customary day; unfortunately, millions will spend this Saturday carrying out orders for a boss rather than disposing of their potential on their own terms.

Work is stealing everything from us. Isn’t it time you took a little back?

Frequently Asked Questions about Steal Something from Work Day

Is STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK immoral?

Stealing is immoral, yes. That’s why your employers should pay you the full value they obtain from your labor, rather than paying you a fraction of it and taking the rest for themselves as profit. If you take something from the workplace, you’re not stealing, but simply taking back the results of your effort.

Is STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK illegal?

Technically, it may be. Slavery, on the other hand, was legal until December 1865.

Is STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK DAY anti-employer?

Hate to break it to you, boss, but your employees steal from you every day. By encouraging them to focus on one day a year, we’re looking out for you! Consider this a harm reduction approach.

Does STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK DAY make it harder for employees to get away with stealing?

Not significantly. The number one obstacle to employee theft is not bosses or cameras, but misguided coworkers. STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK DAY is a consciousness-raising holiday promoting worker solidarity and legitimizing employee redistribution of wealth.

Not everyone has an easy time stealing from the workplace. Some demographics are singled out for surveillance, and many people can’t afford to risk getting into trouble!

That’s true! That’s why, if you are not one of those people, you should STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK to share with those who can’t risk it themselves.

I’m retired. Can I participate in STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK DAY?

Yes, you can—just go back to your former place of employment! If you had to wrestle over a pension with them, they’ve got it coming. It’s never too late to STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK!

I’d love to STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK, but I work at a local non-profit foundation providing free services to survivors of domestic violence.

If you truly love the place you work, chances are it’s under-funded. That’s because the for-profit mega-corporations are hogging all the resources! Time to pay a visit to someone else’s workplace.

But my employers give to charitable causes when they make a profit! If I STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK, they’ll have less to donate.

Who do you think should choose the most deserving charitable cause for your earnings—you, or some corporate bureaucrat? Just because you STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK doesn’t mean you have to keep it all for yourself!

If I STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK, will it make me a more selfish person?

Not necessarily! By and large, people find it easier to share things when they don’t have to trade their lives for them in miserable drudgery. STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK might actually make you a more generous person!

What does God think about STEALING FROM WORK?

Academic theologians such as German Old Testament scholar A. Alt, author of Das Verbot des Diebstahls im Dekalog, suggest that the commandment “thou shalt not steal” was originally intended against stealing people—against abductions and slavery. This lines up with Jewish interpretations of the statement as “thou shalt not kidnap”—for example, as stated by Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki, famed as the author of the first comprehensive commentary on the Talmud. If this is so, the real crime is not the worker taking back a part of the fruit of his labor, but the economic system that forces him into wage slavery in the first place. Likewise, as Jesus explains, “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God” (Matthew 19:24)—don’t put your employer at such risk!

What if I STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK and my company goes out of business? Is this biting the hand that feeds me?

Corporations plan workplace shrinkage into the budget well in advance. They’re practically counting on you to steal something! If that surplus goes unclaimed, it’ll just stay in their coffers as more unearned profits.

Will the costs of STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK be passed on to consumers?

Your employers are shrewd businessmen—if they were simply trying to distribute goods to the needy as affordably as possible, they’d be in a different line of work. That means if they could be charging customers more, they already would be. The prices of their products are determined by the market, not by the cost of producing them.

But won’t STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK destabilize the economy? What if the market crashes again? Will STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK bring about the end of the world?

Are you kidding? Who does all the work in this society—bosses, or workers? If anything, things would go more smoothly without them. If every corporation went out of business tomorrow and we could get our hands on all the resources they’ve hoarded, don’t you think we’d be able to distribute them more sensibly? They’re lucky we don’t steal everything!

Will STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK inhibit real social change? Shouldn’t we be organizing to address the root of our problems rather than acting individualistically?

Maybe you’re onto something! But STEALING SOMETHING FROM WORK doesn’t prevent you from organizing collectively. For example, you could coordinate with your coworkers to share what you pocket. Really, what good would it do to get organized together if you were still afraid to take what you deserve? On the other hand, imagine if we could go beyond taking things from our workplaces, and take over the workplaces themselves…

Why is April 15 STEAL SOMETHING FROM WORK DAY?

As most employees know, every day can be Steal Something From Work day. But we can’t encourage people to go steal from their workplaces all the time—

If there was ever a good day to Steal Something From Work, it has to be April 15, Tax Day. For the government, every April 15 is Steal Something From You Day. They take your hard-earned money and dump it right into some oil war or back room deal—that’s yet another way the corporations are making out at your expense.

Remember who’s stealing from you!