Jump to content
UnevenEdge

Railroad unions threaten strike over sick leave demands

matrixman124

By matrixman124
in Current Events

 Share

Recommended Posts

Sawdy Luminary

Sawdy

Posted
Posted (edited)

Nurses, teachers, now railway workers striking in different areas of the country…idk… sounds like we really should be supporting the critical folks in our country with safer work environments, better wages and not take advantage of them for 40+ hours a week…

but I’m just over here

Edited by Sawdy
  • Like 5
  • Thanks 1
katt_goddess Monster Mutant

katt_goddess

Posted
Posted
  On 9/15/2022 at 10:00 AM, Sawdy said:

Nurses, teachers, now railway workers striking in different areas of the country…idk… sounds like we really should be supporting the critical folks in our country with safer work environments, better wages and not take advantage of them for 40+ hours a week…

but I’m just over here

Expand  

"Essential workers" are exempt from all those things.

That's why they were given a shit-tier title that could be used to force them back to work while their bosses, who rely on them to make the money, could self-quarantine and still make their boat payments. 

  • Like 2
Raptorpat Monster Mutant

Raptorpat

Posted
Posted
  On 9/15/2022 at 1:28 PM, matrixman124 said:

Looks like a lot of union members are pissed

Expand  

It's now the union's job to sell this agreement to their members before the ratification vote. If the ratification fails, not only are the negotiations back at square one, but the union leaders are effectively handed a vote of "no confidence".

It feels similar to the fallout from the entertainment workers' near-strike.

  • Like 1
matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 9/15/2022 at 8:04 PM, Raptorpat said:

It's now the union's job to sell this agreement to their members before the ratification vote. If the ratification fails, not only are the negotiations back at square one, but the union leaders are effectively handed a vote of "no confidence".

It feels similar to the fallout from the entertainment workers' near-strike.

Expand  

Good

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 9/16/2022 at 7:38 PM, scoobdog said:

Well they deserve and have every right to exercise that veto.  Still not good if it ends up leading to a strike anyway.

Expand  

I mean it's their right to strike. They need to be given a new deal. Of course it sucks that it will shut down rail lines, but we need to be clear that it's not the railroad workers fault

  • Like 1
  • 4 weeks later...
Raptorpat Monster Mutant

Raptorpat

Posted
Posted
  Quote

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The U.S.’s third largest railroad union rejected a deal with employers Monday, renewing the possibility of a strike that could cripple the economy. B oth sides will return to the bargaining table before that happens.

Over half of track maintenance workers represented by the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division who voted opposed the five-year contract despite 24% raises and $5,000 in bonuses. Union President Tony Cardwell said the railroads didn’t do enough to address the lack of paid time off — particularly sick time — and working conditions after the major railroads eliminated nearly one-third of their jobs over the past six years.

“Railroaders are discouraged and upset with working conditions and compensation and hold their employer in low regard. Railroaders do not feel valued,” Cardwell said in a statement. “They resent the fact that management holds no regard for their quality of life, illustrated by their stubborn reluctance to provide a higher quantity of paid time off, especially for sickness.”

The group that represents the railroads in negotiations said they were disappointed the union rejected the agreement, but emphasized that no immediate threat of a strike exists because the union agreed to keep working for now.

Four other railroad unions have approved their agreements with freight railroads including BNSF, Union Pacific, Kansas City Southern, CSX and Norfolk Southern, but all 12 unions representing 115,000 workers must ratify their contracts to prevent a strike. Another union, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, initially rejected its deal but has since renegotiated a new contract. Voting will be completed in mid-November.

Expand  

https://apnews.com/article/business-economy-government-and-politics-0744cffe919f0d48fcc02d16c8a298b3

  • 1 month later...
Raptorpat Monster Mutant

Raptorpat

Posted
Posted

I believe only 5 of 8 (I think) unions have ratified the agreement with three holdouts (I think) and the deadline a few days out. So Congress going to vote to approve the contract and preempt a shutdown.

Edit: just walked into this article that says part of the reason they didn't extend negotiations again (on top of the consensus that they stalemated), is that a Republican house would have leverage to impose a worse deal https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/29/bidens-congress-halt-rail-strike-00071251

  • Thanks 2
matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Yeah this is looking very ugly. The Biden administration is basically trying to stop the unions from exercising their rights as unions to prevent the strikes. More negotiations are needed here, not capitulation to the rail companies.

20221129_222119.jpg

  • Thanks 1
scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted

I wonder how the Republicans will push a worse deal, unless the point is that if the deal is rejected, the rail companies can back out of the deal and the Republicans will stand by?

1pooh4u Monster Mutant

1pooh4u

Posted
Posted

These workers get no sick days they deserve to have paid sick time. Biden is wrong to put this on the workers when they can’t even have a sick day. What else are they demanding other than 4 days pd sick leave 

Raptorpat Monster Mutant

Raptorpat

Posted
Posted
  On 11/30/2022 at 3:47 AM, scoobdog said:

I wonder how the Republicans will push a worse deal, unless the point is that if the deal is rejected, the rail companies can back out of the deal and the Republicans will stand by?

Expand  

three of the unions rejected it, so those technically have no deal

NewBluntsworth Legend

NewBluntsworth

Posted
Posted (edited)
  On 11/30/2022 at 1:30 PM, matrixman124 said:

They should go on strike. Nobody is taking their threats seriously.

Expand  

Absolutely. Got the fake FDR President and the Democratic-controlled Congress breathing down their necks, trying to pit the American public against them, telling these critically essential union workers to shut up and quit whining about unreasonable luxuries like "sick days" and go back to work on whatever terms the giant billionaire conglomerate claims should be acceptable, FUCK OFF

Edited by NewBluntsworth
Dems are trash
  • Like 1
Master-Debater131 Hero

Master-Debater131

Posted
Posted

Ive heard that at this point the Union would be willing to sign the deal if they get 4 sick days a year.

4 days.
Thats pitiful. Just give them the damn 4 days. If your business cant handle people potentially getting sick for 4 days a year then its horribly managed.

Gotta say, Im on the side of the Union in this one.

  • Thanks 4
Poofy Aristocrat

Poofy

Posted
Posted
  On 11/30/2022 at 2:55 PM, Master-Debater131 said:

Ive heard that at this point the Union would be willing to sign the deal if they get 4 sick days a year.

4 days.
Thats pitiful. Just give them the damn 4 days. If your business cant handle people potentially getting sick for 4 days a year then its horribly managed.

Gotta say, Im on the side of the Union in this one.

Expand  

Not v free market of you. Thats not the only issue anyway, but the media amirite. The workers also don't want jobs replaced by automation. The companies believe we're at a place w/automation where we don't need 2 people on every train, they want to let suitable trains go out with a single engineer

scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted

Rare we're all in agreement.  I honestly don't see the reason for trying to push this through given how reasonable the demands are and how rail owners have a vested interest in agreeing to them in..  At best, it makes Biden look like he's jumpy when he should be projecting confidence in the process.

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 11/30/2022 at 6:36 PM, scoobdog said:

Rare we're all in agreement.  I honestly don't see the reason for trying to push this through given how reasonable the demands are and how rail owners have a vested interest in agreeing to them in..  At best, it makes Biden look like he's jumpy when he should be projecting confidence in the process.

Expand  

It makes him look like he's afraid to make rail owners and Republicans upset

  • Thanks 1
scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 11/30/2022 at 6:39 PM, matrixman124 said:

It makes him look like he's afraid to make rail owners and Republicans upset

Expand  

More like he's trying to avoid looking like he failed a negotiation.  A deal that complex isn't solved in a matter of a week, and just the fact he got involved was enough to prevent a strike given the circumstances. (Yeah, I know the other unions were still threatening, but they wouldn't as long as the negotiations continued). He just got trigger happy when he probably should have had a little more faith in the parties to get the job done without causing an infrastructural shutdown.

  • D'oh 1
matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 11/30/2022 at 8:19 PM, scoobdog said:

More like he's trying to avoid looking like he failed a negotiation.  A deal that complex isn't solved in a matter of a week, and just the fact he got involved was enough to prevent a strike given the circumstances. (Yeah, I know the other unions were still threatening, but they wouldn't as long as the negotiations continued). He just got trigger happy when he probably should have had a little more faith in the parties to get the job done without causing an infrastructural shutdown.

Expand  

All he had to do was arm twist the rail companies to relent to the sick days. That's it. He is too afraid of upsetting them and any Republicans who could be up for bipartisan legislature.

scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 1:36 AM, matrixman124 said:

All he had to do was arm twist the rail companies to relent to the sick days. That's it. He is too afraid of upsetting them and any Republicans who could be up for bipartisan legislature.

Expand  

To be fair, he has more to lose politically if there is strike than if there isn’t, so, yeah, that is part of it.

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
  On 12/1/2022 at 7:36 AM, scoobdog said:

That begs the questions of either why the unions couldn’t get them to acquiesce or why the government got involved.

Expand  

Because the rail companies don't want to give them more benefits because it cuts into their profits. They're being greedy and they think they can get away with it because they know the government will intervene to prevent the strike because of how devastating it would be.

Edited by matrixman124
  • Thanks 1
scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 12:02 PM, matrixman124 said:

Because the rail companies don't want to give them more benefits because it cuts into their profits. They're being greedy and they think they can get away with it because they know the government will intervene to prevent the strike because of how devastating it would be.

Expand  

Not what I meant.  It’s obvious they’re understaffing to cut corners, but why don’t the unions have leverage in the negotiations?  The rail companies certainly wouldn’t have called a pro Union POTUS to the negotiations unless they knew something.  My money is there’s some corruption in the union leadership that’s preventing them from being in lockstep.

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
  On 12/1/2022 at 5:41 PM, scoobdog said:

Not what I meant.  It’s obvious they’re understaffing to cut corners, but why don’t the unions have leverage in the negotiations?  The rail companies certainly wouldn’t have called a pro Union POTUS to the negotiations unless they knew something.  My money is there’s some corruption in the union leadership that’s preventing them from being in lockstep.

Expand  

What I'm saying is that the Democrats and Republicans are probably in the rail companies' pockets because lobbying. I don't think Biden deserves the benefit of the doubt when the solution is so simple and apparent.

He's more focused on working with the Republicans to prevent the strike instead of working with the unions to prevent the strike. And the Republicans will always favor the rail companies over the workers.

Edited by matrixman124
  • Thanks 1
scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 5:51 PM, matrixman124 said:

What I'm saying is that the Democrats and Republicans are probably in the rail companies' pockets because lobbying. I don't think Biden deserves the benefit of the doubt when the solution is so simple and apparent.

Expand  

I know what you're saying, and I agree.  Regardless of what you think about who's in who's pocket, it's generally agreed that getting the government (or any third party) involved is usually a bad idea.  Why even call on them when the solution is, as you say, simple and apparent?

Anyway you look at it, we're looking at the back-end of a botched negotiation, and it seems to be pointing to bigger issues than just a government that's corrupt and/or hamstrung.  The government shouldn't be involved in the first place, and the only two reasons I can think of for why they are is (a) the Biden administration is so sensitive they're preemptively inserting themselves into the negotiations, and (b) the negotiations are a disorganized mess and the government is needed to  reign in one or both sides.

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
  On 12/1/2022 at 6:07 PM, scoobdog said:

I know what you're saying, and I agree.  Regardless of what you think about who's in who's pocket, it's generally agreed that getting the government (or any third party) involved is usually a bad idea.  Why even call on them when the solution is, as you say, simple and apparent?

Anyway you look at it, we're looking at the back-end of a botched negotiation, and it seems to be pointing to bigger issues than just a government that's corrupt and/or hamstrung.  The government shouldn't be involved in the first place, and the only two reasons I can think of for why they are is (a) the Biden administration is so sensitive they're preemptively inserting themselves into the negotiations, and (b) the negotiations are a disorganized mess and the government is needed to  reign in one or both sides.

Expand  

The unions would be unreasonable if the rail companies gave in to the sick day demands and the unions wanted more. The rail companies are giving them nothing.

Edited by matrixman124
scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 6:33 PM, matrixman124 said:

Bingo. And Biden doesn't want that (understandably) but instead of getting the rail companies to acquiesce, he's trying to essentially seize the unions' right to strike to prevent the strike. It's not a good look.

Expand  

It's beyond a bad look, though it likely doesn't mean much given his already low approval.  How did some of the unions initially come to an agreement on this bad deal while others did not?

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 6:46 PM, scoobdog said:

It's beyond a bad look, though it likely doesn't mean much given his already low approval.  How did some of the unions initially come to an agreement on this bad deal while others did not?

Expand  

The offer is a wage increase and 1 paid sick day but no additional PTO besides that. Not all the unions agreed to that. So Congress will be forcing them to accept terms now. Pretty fucked up.

scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 9:04 PM, matrixman124 said:

The offer is a wage increase and 1 paid sick day but no additional PTO besides that. Not all the unions agreed to that. So Congress will be forcing them to accept terms now. Pretty fucked up.

Expand  

See, that's my point.  Biden's failure here isn't diminished by the fact that the unions don't seem to be on the same page with some ratifying and others not.

matrixman124 Icon

matrixman124

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 9:13 PM, scoobdog said:

See, that's my point.  Biden's failure here isn't diminished by the fact that the unions don't seem to be on the same page with some ratifying and others not.

Expand  

Some unions are ratifying out of desperation. The rest know that it's a shit offer and want just a few days more.

scoobdog Monster Mutant

scoobdog

Posted
Posted
  On 12/1/2022 at 10:10 PM, matrixman124 said:

Some unions are ratifying out of desperation. The rest know that it's a shit offer and want just a few days more.

Expand  

If they had stuck together, we wouldn't have had an opportunity for Biden's administration to latch on to a low-ball offer.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
 Share
Go to topic listing
×
×
  • Create New...