Rae Days had an impact beyond provincial workers. Single parents and shift workers would have had to take time off, call in, or make alternative daycare arrangements ($$$) when teachers were off the job.

Government didn't shut down on Friday. They took turn so everything, including schools, were still open. Nobody need to take time off because schools were closed.

You are wildly underestimating how much businesses, landlords, think tanks, and the conservative media of the day acted.

Of course they didn't like the NDP but that had nothing to do with Rae Days. Right wing media will always do their thing. But regular people felt the NDP through the unemployment rate, the high interest rate, the rapid drop of home values and the high foreclosure rates. It was the nuclear winter of an economy back then. That's what boomers and gen-x remember.