International Workers' Day in China Today, May 1st, is International Workers’ Day in China. This Chinese Labour Day, which falls on the 1st of May every year, has been officially celebrated since 1990, but it started to be observed from 1920s by the Communist Party of China and its predecessors under different names including Labour Day or May Day. The holiday was officially approved in mainland China by the State Council of the People's Republic of China in 2008 after its celebration was resumed in Hong Kong and Macau as part of their handover to the People's Republic of China in 1997 and 1999 respectively. How it started May 1 is an annual celebration of worker's rights. The day was chosen to commemorate an 1886 demonstration by Chicago workers which turned violent when police were called to break up a parade, resulting in several deaths and many more injuries. When Socialist leader Eugene V. Debs led another May 1 demonstration a decade later, it ended without bloods...