MTA Strike.................................

If there is a transit strike no one driving a car is allowed fewer than 4 people in the car............

for those of you that have no idea about the NY MTA let me put it like this.....
technically they aren't allowed to strike
regardless of that since they are planning on striking they will basically shut DOWN NYC during it's busiest time of the year...............

many of them make well over six figures annually with overtime

personally I'm wondering if many of these assholes have forgotten that the city is still hustling to recover financially from 9/11

When you say many...you are absolutely wrong. So get it straight. You read some articles between 10 & 15 years ago showing , and I'll be extremely, extremely, extremely generous, 50 employees making six figures in overtime...well there are roughly 25,000 employees working for transit. And when that happened, essentially those people never went home. They basically gave up their lives for a solid year to increase their pension. Now transit goes by the average of your last three years of service. THAT OVERTIME SH*T IS OVER, and I know because I work there. Overtime is looked at every week! And let me put the record straight, I'm not in the union. Quite frankly NYCT has the lowest paid transit workers in the country! And they run 24/7! 911 has nothing to do with their salaries so you're wrong there also. And if you mean crippling the city during the holidays is a bad move because we're recovering from 911 don't be angry with the workers (write a letter to Bush). Transit has the money to pay. They have over a billion dollars. And if they're saying they have that, you know it's more. And these assholes as you put it ARE THE LIFE BLOOD OF THIS CITY. And please don't go talking about how bad the service is. Reality check...this is New York Freakin' City. We move over a million people a day (with their hang-ups, problems, illnesses, craziness and whatever). And you know how New Yorkers are! Ask anybody in the customer service business in this city. Everyone is in a rush, everyone is late. 85% of the delays in service is caused by the public. There is no where else in this country you can travel the distances you do here for the price you pay. And I believe the subway should be free. Let Wall Street pay for it. OK now...Let me get off this rant...And don't worry, there won't be a strike. The Taylor Law basically takes two additional days pay away for everyday you're on strike. So you lose the day's pay for not being at work, then you lose two more days pay in fines. if there was a strike it wouldn't last a week. Five days would equal fifteen days lost pay and you know most people are living paycheck to paycheck. There won't be a strike. Our Mayor won't let it happen. The money is there.

Romeodred,

You're probably a good guy and all, but you need to understand that the overwhelming majority of NYC residents loathe both the Transport Workers Union and the MTA. From their perspective, you are overpaid for what is widely regarded as increasingly substandard performance. If you guys strike, you will have less sympathy and generate more anger than any strike in this city’s recent memory.

-Quinn

A strike WILL NOT HAPPEN. The TWU 100 is a joke, and are paid under the table to take bad deals. Its been that way in the past, and will remain that way. If they didnt strike in 2002, they wont strike now!!

I was just an itty-bitty guy when ATU 589 struck the (Boston) MTA in the early 60's, but I appreciated the long walk I took to work on the day that its succesor agency, the MBTA (Or "T") had its "sick out" in the late 70's.

Boston transit was always held together by a certain work ethic until the retirement of Edward G. Dana in 1959. Dana rose up through the ranks from conductor for the Boston El to become that company's president in 1919 (Though I recollect that he also married General Bancroft's daughter to get a familial tie to the company as well). Dana had good relations and understanding with the Carmen's Union Local 589 of the AASERMCEA/ATU and most labor strains were mediated quickly without any disruption of service. After his retirement, the leadership went to management school and later political party men that chafed the unions to no end. One of the early post-Dana managers even wound up as the central figure in Boston's contribution to the GM/National City Lines scandal of that era (See Who Framed Roger Rabbit for a comic take on that).

The rift between union and management in Boston's transit is most evident in things like the popular "How many ATU members does it take to change a lightbulb?". The scary fact: Five. The Motorman to run the line car, the Conductor to tell the motorman when to stop, go, back up, etc., the Brakeman to make sure the Motorman stops the car, the Electrician to make sure the light socket is working properly, and a Laborer to actually install the official Phillips Street Railway Bulb. The union has fought to keep anachronistic jobs such as Conductor and Brakemen for decades since the positions were made obsolete by automatic signaling equipment and reliable air brake systems. <Thinking> Though it's possible/likely that two of those positions are IBEW and not ATU.

Hey, JWBL, if they strike can I come up and play with their trains? I learned how to run them when I was 13 and spent a day last summer playing with one of the old IRT cars. :)

I am so glad I walk to work.

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Originally Posted by romeodred

When you say many...you are absolutely wrong. So get it straight. You read some articles between 10 & 15 years ago showing , and I'll be extremely, extremely, extremely generous, 50 employees making six figures in overtime...well there are roughly 25,000 employees working for transit. And when that happened, essentially those people never went home. They basically gave up their lives for a solid year to increase their pension. Now transit goes by the average of your last three years of service. THAT OVERTIME SH*T IS OVER, and I know because I work there. Overtime is looked at every week! And let me put the record straight, I'm not in the union. Quite frankly NYCT has the lowest paid transit workers in the country!

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Considering there aren't a plethora of transit companies for machines like 'subways' in the United States I'd find it hard to believe that cities such as Chicago and even Los Angeles with their "never finished completely" subway system are paying their workers more than you guys

Quote:

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Originally Posted by romeodred

And they run 24/7! 911 has nothing to do with their salaries so you're wrong there also. And if you mean crippling the city during the holidays is a bad move because we're recovering from 911 don't be angry with the workers (write a letter to Bush).

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It does cripple the city, I could care less if it's 50 out of the 25k or the whole 25k that goes on strike, you signed up for a job that you get PAID for and now that you have that job (something people in NYC that don't have jobs would love to have) you strike during the most important time to basically make a statement, because being a former city worker I can assure you whatever settlement you'd get from the city would not be instantaneous, it would be given to you gradually over time

Quote:

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Originally Posted by romeodred

Transit has the money to pay. They have over a billion dollars. And if they're saying they have that, you know it's more. And these assholes as you put it ARE THE LIFE BLOOD OF THIS CITY.

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Yall aren't the lifeblood of the city, get a grip dred, the lifeblood of the city is the corner store.................lol at any point 24 hours 7 days a week you can walk out of your apt and go down the street to the CORNERSTORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and the owner will always be there with the cat on the bread, and the 40 oz. ice cold for the "homies" and the milk never spoiled, that's the LIFE BLOOD OF THIS CITY, without the cornerstore we'd all be screwed...................

Quote:

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Originally Posted by romeodred

And please don't go talking about how bad the service is. Reality check...this is New York Freakin' City. We move over a million people a day (with their hang-ups, problems, illnesses, craziness and whatever). And you know how New Yorkers are! Ask anybody in the customer service business in this city. Everyone is in a rush, everyone is late. 85% of the delays in service is caused by the public. There is no where else in this country you can travel the distances you do here for the price you pay. And I believe the subway should be free. Let Wall Street pay for it. OK now...Let me get off this rant...And don't worry, there won't be a strike. The Taylor Law basically takes two additional days pay away for everyday you're on strike. So you lose the day's pay for not being at work, then you lose two more days pay in fines. if there was a strike it wouldn't last a week. Five days would equal fifteen days lost pay and you know most people are living paycheck to paycheck. There won't be a strike. Our Mayor won't let it happen. The money is there.

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The service isn't bad, it's actually quite good, if you use it. I hardly use the subway system but when I did last Saturday the workers on the train were more helpful than I thought they ever would be. And you're wrong with that 85% shit, 85% of the delays in service is caused by the subway rats................ that's right I said it Subway rats...........you all know those big fuckin rats will fuck up a train track at any given point in time, but do you muhfuckas set out glue traps, noooooooooooooooooooo

and you're right yall ain't striking, It's Christmas and you like every other New Yorker needs to get that Xbox 360 or Ipod Nano for ya kid(s), you just talk a good game. Only problem is Bloomberg don't givafuck........... he'd rather fire yall (if he had the power to do so) and hire new people with an iron-clad contract that go through this bullshit

nuff said
p.s. romeo you still my bro, lol, you transit strikin muhfucka

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JohnnyWalkerBlackLabel

Considering there aren't a plethora of transit companies for machines like 'subways' in the United States I'd find it hard to believe that cities such as Chicago and even Los Angeles with their "never finished completely" subway system are paying their workers more than you guys

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Does anyone have the current figures handy? :)

Boston once held the crown for highest paid transit workers in the nation, but this is stale news (I haven't been in the loop, so to speak, in a couple of decades). The formula includes benefits packages that can almost double the hourly wage, but which are "invisible" to the workers until they kick in at retirement/illness/death. An example is my own federal pay package which claims a figure more than 40% higher than my actual gross salary in unpaid dollar amounts such as sick leave, unused vacation leave, retirement "value", etc.

It must be good, though, as the rare call for operators is answered by thousands who are then chosen by lottery.

http://nydailynews.com/front/story/285955p-244831c.html

Do they really deserve a raise?

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Originally Posted by popperluv

http://nydailynews.com/front/story/285955p-244831c.html

Do they really deserve a raise?

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CLASSIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!

LMAO

oh and Bearded, my apologies for forgetting Boston, Yankees fan, I blank Boston out alot