To the NYC Transit workers...

[utahdog2003]

47 grand in NYC is 19 grand in Manhattan. If I made 19 grand in Jacksonville I'd be bitching like a poked pig. People, Manhattan is not the complete boutique temple of the gods you see on TV, still quite a few places on the island where a stroll in the park in a nice pair of shoes will get you knocked over the head.

And The Bronx!! Are you kidding?!

I'm not saying the strike is right, just that the dough they make is not a huge sum (and an average at that.) People who don't understand the economics of the situation should bite their tongues on this. If it were your paycheck you'd probably have a much different viewpoint than "F*** the Unions." If you've never sat in a union negotiation, you have no idea how many promises municipalities AND unions make to one another and never keep. That 8% could be a cumulative raise suspended since 9/11 that those folks have done without for 5 years. How can you say it isn't deserved? Sitting in Tennessee and Georgia...you never know.

"Get another job" you say...

HR Rep, ACME Inc. : "Mr Jones, what are your qualifications for this position?"

Mr Jones: "I've been a subway conductor for 17 years."

HR Rep, ACME Inc. : "HMMM...that qualifies you for *clickety clickety clickety*...being a, uh, Subway Conductor. So Sorry. Thank you for doing the thankless job of dragging my ass to work for the last 17 years, now go bus tables and leave me alone!"



Sorry, I'd rather chuck a bit more cash at a trained conductor than fire his ass and hire a punk twerp in droopy pants with a Gameboy to drive my butt to work for 10 bucks an hour.

 

[Andrew Homan]

This thread is loaded with Christmas spirit. Only people who should comment are New Yorkers. None of us live there or are affected by it. Nothing like telling someone they are worthless and not earning what they are paid. I'm against unions too, and if the strike is illegal fine the crap out of them but you guys are just insulting most of these people. And a college degree, which I have, doesn't mean shit. I watch educated people make stupid decisions all the time. Get off your F$%#king high horse. Part of being educated is not being closed minded.

 

[MikeD]

perhaps this is the first sign of the end of the world.. all transportation will hault in NYC and the stock market will fall to its knees... a few years later.. stalking elk through the damp canyon forests round the ruins of Rockefeller Center. You will wear leather clothes that last you the rest of your
life. You will climb the wrist- thick kudzu vines that wrap the Sears Tower. You will see tiny figures pounding corn and laying-strips of venison on the empty car pool lane of the ruins of a superhighway...

/or not..

 

[MarkP]

Even the journalist are bitching about six figure pay in NYC.

Are Journalists Underpaid? Pity the sad, broke New York Times reporter.

. . . . Most experienced reporters and editors at the publications in question earn salaries in the low six figures. They can expect salaries to rise by a few percentage points a year, if they're lucky. Salaries that barely pierce six figures certainly aren't insulting to most Americans. But everything is relative. A couple doing quite well?he's an editor at the Journal, she's a reporter at the Times?could make up to $250,000. But after New York taxes, New York child care, and New York housing, you're not left with much. In New York City, you can't buy a co-op or a condo with only 10 percent down. In most desirable suburbs, you can't buy a starter house for less than $700,000. When children arrive, the couple has to choose between living in an expensive town with good public schools (which means long, painful commutes), or the prospect of private-school tuition at $25,000 per kid per year. Given the types of lives many journalists wish to lead?and think they're entitled to lead by virtue of their education and positions?the wages aren't anywhere near sufficient . . . .​

. . . .We New York-area journalists shouldn't ask for pity, and we don't deserve it. As a class, we're bourgeois and ambitious. We like comfort and access, but we don't want to work all that hard. Working for clients, as our lawyer neighbors do, is anathema. . . .​

Mmmmm . . maybe they should go talk to the transit worker. I think I should have posted this under Left Leaning Media. Six figure salaries for fish wrap.

 

[flyfisher11]

.... And a college degree, which I have, doesn't mean shit. I watch educated people make stupid decisions all the time. Get off your F$%#king high horse. Part of being educated is not being closed minded.

Ditto and well said!

Merry Christmas

 

[syoung]

I don't think you have to be a New Yorker to comment on it- everyone is entitled to an opinion whether it's informed or not.
Sure, NY is expensive- just like lots of areas, but you don't F the innocent public because you want to make something more and unreasonable out of a entry level job. Maybe if they didn't pay extortion, I mean DUES to their union- they'd have a few more ducketts in their pocket.

 

[Trailpimp]

I think the Business agent usually drives around in something funded by those dues......Fire them all and hire scabs!

 

[p m]

And a college degree, which I have, doesn't mean shit. I watch educated people make stupid decisions all the time. Get off your F$%#king high horse. Part of being educated is not being closed minded.

it doesn't necessarily mean shit - but, by the time you get your bachelor's degree, you're 4 years behind in pay compared to those who didn't go to college, and ~$80k deeper in debt. Pretty noticeable sacrifice for higher skill set, and it has to be valued accordingly.
Back in '95, GM would pay $43k/year for an engineer with PhD in ME, health benefits split between the employees and company. At the same time, union workers were getting close to $98k/year in combined wages and benefits.
Look where GM is now...

 

[Andrew Homan]

it doesn't necessarily mean shit - but, by the time you get your bachelor's degree, you're 4 years behind in pay compared to those who didn't go to college, and ~$80k deeper in debt. Pretty noticeable sacrifice for higher skill set, and it has to be valued accordingly.
Back in '95, GM would pay $43k/year for an engineer with PhD in ME, health benefits split between the employees and company. At the same time, union workers were getting close to $98k/year in combined wages and benefits.
Look where GM is now...

So you think a rookie engineer with 1 month experience should make more than a 20 senior production supervisor who is directly responsible for the quality of the vehicle being built? I have major respect for engineers. But just having a degree doesn't prove your worth. I'm not bashing college. In fact most of my family has a masters degree some higher, but school is a small part of it.

Not wanting to offend here just my opinion

 

[syoung]

My wife has a Master's (grad with 3.97 GPA) and she would have had to take a $50K pay cut to be a teacher instead of being a hottie bartender. Edumacation doesn't always pay. A good IT guy is worth his weight in gold and LOTS of them didn't do college, they were too busy taking apart XT's and Apple IIs to bother with social things like optional school. Results are king, not certificates on the wall.

 

[rmuller]

A good IT guy is worth his weight in gold and LOTS of them didn't do college, they were too busy taking apart XT's and Apple IIs to bother with social things like optional school. Results are king, not certificates on the wall.

Until their company realizes that they can get some new hot-shot for 1/3rd of the existing guys salary.. This is now happening to a lot of my friends who went straight into the IT field instead of college in the mid-90s.. now they are going back to college so they aren't just limited to that one field...

 

[SmellyGuppy]

It doesn't matter if they make 20k...it is their choice to make 20K. If these people want it better, they need to work for it. Unions are breeding mediocre, unmotivated humans lately. We had a similar situation here in CA with the supermarkets last year...Bottom line? If I sat out on front of my work with a sign demanding anything and refusing to work until I got it...I could laugh all the way to the unemployment line.
Just like I told the grocery baggers who wanted rediculous things here last year as i gladly shopped in the stores (alone, as I guess I was the only person in CA who thought they were being spoiled brats)...you made your destiny...don't whine about it. Go back to school and do something with yourself if you want better benefits...You work in the subway, you are not curing cancer.

Don't demand that goodies be handed to you...no one else in the real world gets to. At least no one over 3 years old.

 

[SmellyGuppy]

Until their company realizes that they can get some new hot-shot for 1/3rd of the existing guys salary.. This is now happening to a lot of my friends who went straight into the IT field instead of college in the mid-90s.. now they are going back to college so they aren't just limited to that one field...

Most smart companies know you get what you pay for, though.
I know of a specific certain larger size company (anyone here would know who they were if they knew the name) who replaced alot of their highly paid IT staff with newbies who touted degrees and bootcamp CCNP's and such...but darn, they were cheap.


A few of the new "experts" decided to "work" on one of the pix firewall configs a few weeks after they started...the network was compromised a few days later...after about $15 million in losses, the old highly paid staff got their jobs back, and got paid even higher.

 

[rmuller]

Most smart companies know you get what you pay for, though.
I know of a specific certain larger size company (anyone here would know who they were if they knew the name) who replaced alot of their highly paid IT staff with newbies who touted degrees and bootcamp CCNP's and such...but darn, they were cheap.


A few of the new "experts" decided to "work" on one of the pix firewall configs a few weeks after they started...the network was compromised a few days later...after about $15 million in losses, the old highly paid staff got their jobs back, and got paid even higher.

Yeah, unfortunately there are a lot of dumb companies.

 

[utahdog2003]

Most smart companies know you get what you pay for, though.
I know of a specific certain larger size company (anyone here would know who they were if they knew the name) who replaced alot of their highly paid IT staff with newbies who touted degrees and bootcamp CCNP's and such...but darn, they were cheap.


A few of the new "experts" decided to "work" on one of the pix firewall configs a few weeks after they started...the network was compromised a few days later...after about $15 million in losses, the old highly paid staff got their jobs back, and got paid even higher.

This sounds like an argument for paying seasoned Transit workers more money....

 

[utahdog2003]

This thread is loaded with Christmas spirit. Only people who should comment are New Yorkers. None of us live there or are affected by it. Nothing like telling someone they are worthless and not earning what they are paid.

Exactly. If you aint a stranded New Yorker (like my brother in lower Man) or an angry Transit worker, then you're just another under-informed mob-member screaming from a thousand miles away about what another man deserves for his days work. A days work you do not understand. Screaming an argument you gleaned from a 30 sec sound-bite ganked from Robin and Company on CNN.

I'm sure Bloomberg and the Transit Authority are concerned about the thoughts of a couple Dwebbers from Virginia (et al.)

 

[Randy]

OK, I'm not in NYC but I work just outside it for a Manhattan based company, half the people I need to interact with to get my job done are NOT in the office yesterday and today because of the strike. My project will now be late. I am impacted. I have a daughter in College in NYC. I cannot pick her up for the holidays because of the required 4 persons per car rule in Manhattan. I am impacted.

So now that I've thrown my bona fides out there I can say my piece.

Unions that once served a very important purpose, and caused our government to rewrite labor laws to protect just about everyone, have outlived their purpose. They are singlehandedly killing Americas world dominance in manufacturing. Paying people enormous amounts of money and benefits, under threat and duress, for what is basically unskilled labor, is the problem. That along with really poor management and product design, is bringing our auto industry to it's knees. It has destroyed the second largest Steel Company in the world, Bethlehem Steel, which essentially no longer exists. I could go on and on....but you guys know all this, and unionized transit workers are only concerned with getting more money and benefits for the same reason we are all interested in getting them. The problem here is that pay and benfits should be commensurate (sp?) with skill and work level/danger level of the job. When the salary is too high for the job, the imbalance (rising costs of transportation in this case) affects everyone. If you really want to see an imbalance, go find out the average salary for a garbage collector in NYC! That will blow your mind!

Flame away!

 

[FrankyRizzo]

Moral of the story: Unions had their purpose 100 years ago, they should be abolished by now. F' unions!

Here here! I have been saying that for years.

 

[Joey]

The sad thing is (IMHO) that most of the Transit workers probably don't want to strike, but the union is makeing them do so.

I have seen many a union cause more issues for the employees than the employees would ever want. One of my customers had a Union run shop in Detroit, the union charged $50 to join and the employees were getting around $7 or $8 an hour. Contract time came and the union people sat down with the company and when it was done the opted for $6.50 an hour for the employees. (they were enjoying the heavy turn over at $50 per employee at around 100 employees a month.) But remember the employees voted in the union for their benifit. Needless to say they couldn't keep even bad employees working, so they had to close the building down and move out of state.

 

[Randy]

I can't say one way or the other if this is all the Union's doing or if the members fully support it, but they had to vote to strike, and they are each and every one of them being fined 2 days pay for EACH day they are out on strike on top of the $1m/day that the union is paying........BTW, where does all that fine money go?