Railworks America

Highly unusual worker behavior in its timing and scope. Disconcerting.

New Jersey Transit suspended rail service into and out of New York City on Friday night after members of the locomotive engineers’ union called out sick en masse to protest a lack of holiday pay on Juneteenth

https://nypost.com/2022/06/17/nj-transi ... n-sickout/

Some folks find something to be offended about every day. The rest of us just be the best we can be.

That's not it. What your seeing is public workers reacting to diminished purchasing power due to inflation. Their contracts lock wages for a fixed term. This is a negotiation tactic. Once public transit gets theirs, next up will be sanitation, fire and police. Then what happens is the city either taxes or borrows if they can to stem the tide. Then the city will max out its bond issuance capability and people will leave the city for the taxes, thus the city looses even more tax revenue and borrowing power.

This marks the beginning of an era of the city being unable to provide basic public services, Then bankruptcy and general chaos. And the captives, NYC residents, will suffer in ways that are unfathomable to suburban and rural residents.

That's what struck me. But left that unsaid to see if anyone remembers the 70s.

Remember the union members decide what day to pull the plug not the taxpayer.

Interesting how a train related story weaves into current events.

Think Snake Plisskin in 5 years.

Calling the Post journalism is being fairly generous. What they didn’t say in the article is that Juneteenth is a federal holiday, and that the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen were the only union out of 15 who haven’t reached a new contract yet with NJT. The other 14 had Friday as an extra pay day, while BLET members would have been paid the regular amount had they not called in sick. The holiday itself doesn’t really matter, it could’ve been Christmas for all anyone cared; BLET members were unhappy that they would be paid less than their coworkers on a federal holiday, so they decided to take action to try and force NJT’s hand. As for the predictions of a budget crisis, New York gives NJ Transit nothing because it’s not under the MTA’s purview. The most the state will be doing for them in the next decade is splitting the cost of the new Hudson River tunnels and the rehabilitation of the old ones with New Jersey and the Feds. The city itself is a very long way from another financial crisis, and the first thing to get dropped from the budget there will probably be the NYPD spy plane and late-night public transit service. So far, Adams has done a pretty good job of closing the budget shortcomings. De Blasio left him with a deficit of just over $5 billion, which he’s managed to get down to just under $3 billion in the past year. New York is a very long way from another financial crisis on the scale of the 1975 one, and I’d say it’s unlikely the city will ever get to that state again, particularly with the importance of tourism to the overall state’s economy.

Thanks Railfan722 your take is an excellent rebuttal to me and the Post. I posted the very first conclusion that came to mind from that article, which was an immediate flashback to the Beame Administration. I'm not an NYC resident, but I saw the city and rode the subway in 1977, it was mind blowing. Your post was reassuring and darn fine writing.