Thursday, December 22, 2005

Matter of respect...my ass...


We are now sliding into the 3rd day of the transit strike. This is how it’s going so far…..

My 2 remaining finals are postponed ‘til next week my professors seem to think the strike will not last beyond this week. I am not too sure about that. I think they should have made contingency plans that went beyond 7 days just in case. The strike has seemed to become a personal thing between our mayor, governor and the union president Toussaint.

On the first day our mayor accused the strikers of thuggery and not looking out for the people of New York. Businesses are losing money, people are spending more money than they earn per day trying to get into work. So far everyone I’ve encountered wants to beat the union leader down, they all feel that in looking out for themselves the union failed to realize they are f’ing our city over financially. This just when we are starting to recover from the financial distress 9/11. People are standing outside Metro North stations and Penn Station in freezing weather for up to 4 hrs at a time trying to get into the city to work. Schools are practically empty in my brother’s school of 5,000 they only had 500 kids show up the 1st day of the strike and today they had less the school was so empty they were playing man hunt in the halls.

While I support what the union is trying to do for the next generation of transit workers I oppose the strike. The MTA had conceded on the matter of salary increases I felt that with continued negotiations the rest could have been resolved. The thing is this when all is said and done the union workers will have a job to go back to…but what about the people who can’t go into work and lose their jobs because of this?

The union claims that this strike is about respect… but where is the respect for the public many who are worse off financially than the transit workers? A lot of people who ride the subways aren’t earning 47-55 thousand per year before over time…a lot of them are struggling paycheck to paycheck and this strike is going to be hardest on them.
Matter of respect my ass, that’s all I’m saying for now.

Story Link: NY 1

Labels: news items

Posted by @ 1:26 AM
1 comment from:  Just Jane,