They better, because people’s lives are in their hands and if they fuck up…. Literally nothing will happen just like with the rest of the cops. They will control the narrative like they always do. Since they’ve made it clear that they will not address the actual issue with police, why bother training them extra? Save money and let them run amok like always. They’re not going to change, they have too much power to ever think about trying, so it’s start to accepting them as hopeless.
It's just another step towards Ender's Game type shit. I have pretty strong views of the current incarnation of the police. More hardware is definitely not the answer.
For someone who has paid closer attention that I have, can you explain why the railroad strike issue is a thing? Specifically why the unions agreed to a compromise that it appears the rank and file is rejecting so hard they're willing to strike over it. If it was a standard union vs management thing, I'd get it, but it seems like there was an agreement in place, but the union isn't aligned with its own members? I'm a bit lost.
It was brokered with the help of the government and didn't include one of the big demands the workers wanted (paid sick days). The railroads have cut employment by 30% over the past few years in order to increase profits and don't want to hire workers in order to cover sick days. The employees are pretty much on call 24/7 even on "days off". It's a shit situation IMO and Biden should allow them to strike. Yes, it would disrupt the supply chain further, but the employees deserve better treatment.
I guess my question is why would the union agree to a compromise that is missing one of the core demands of their rank and file? One that is apparently so critical that the compromise is dead on arrival without it.
Rail workers have a shit deal in terms of what they get. Their union leadership must be terrible. That said, if the federal government wants to break railroad strikes, they can start by getting rid of (or significantly augmenting) the Jones Act.
The per unit cost of shipping goods via water vs. rail is generally cheaper, albeit a bit slower. Freeing up the US waterways, which are the longest and most contiguously navigable ones in the world, would begin dropping rail freight costs and would diminish the negotiating power of rail workers.
Railroads must be one of those legacy industries stuck in the 1800s. Ive heard the nightmare stories of the work expected out of them on fucked up hours. Naturally it leads to a workforce of reprobate drug addicts. I wonder what their vacation time is, if they get them? My last job was PTO and youd use it for anything sick days vacay and on. I heard the compromise was 1 sick day, what a fucking joke. Though if they get 2+ weeks of vacation time Id be less inclined to care (I get 2 weeks plus 3 sick days at my shitty job). Biden survived the midterms relatively unscathed, Im guessing a strike and possible recession would be out of the way by 2024. Surprised he didnt got to bat for the workers.
Makes me wonder if there isn't some other aspect of the contract that they have that is meant to make up for the lack of sick days that isn't being covered in the news everywhere.
That's my thought. Something doesnt sit right in the whole reporting of the situation and the odd reverse positions either side, for the most part, seem to be taking.
I mean, can anyone give me one piece of info from their existing contract other than "no sick days"? It really feels like they are picking on this one piece and are hammering it for sensationalized news reporting. Maybe the Union leads aren't stupid or misrepresenting them after all? Maybe they negotiated a bunch of other stuff in place of it, and are happy with it? Maybe the union members are too stupid to know or remember that, and are believing the stuff they're seeing in the news? I don't know... it sounds too simplistic to me... this kind of shit usually has a ton of nuance that never gets reported on.
I was actually curious about that yesterday, but I couldn't not find anything on how many PTO days they get currently or what the new contract would give them. One thing I did read is that the are so short staffed that it's pretty much impossible to get PTO days approved. The "Sick Days" would be days off that couldn't be refused and could be requested less than 24 hrs in advance. So, I don't think it's really the number of days off that is the issue. It's the the companies basically won't let them actually take days off without a demerit on the file.
Yea that is interesting, couldn't find it either with a quick search. I know ours is easily accesable to anyone who wants to do a quick google search.
This is what I heard, too: lots of "scheduled" time off that they won't let you use. Question: since the current deal on the table sounds like shit, what would happen if the workers went on strike anyway? They wouldn't just fire them all and hire scabs, would they? Surely rail work is too specialized to just let any jagoff do it without a lot of training. Fun fact: my great, great uncle was one of the organizers for the Union Pacific railroad, and he was assassinated by the mob. There's a book about him.
I'll ask my neighbor for details this weekend. From our last conversation (and others), the unions are corrupt and do not serve most of the members needs.