NYDN Editorial: “Great Train Robbery”
Yesterday evening I continued my coverage of TWU Local 100 members winning raises via arbitration. In the last entry on the subject, I commented on how I was shocked at the lack of response from other sources besides the MTA. I spoke too soon as a few hours later, the New York Daily News’ website featured an editorial on the subject. The title alone “Great train robbery: Arbitrator’s foolish giveaway will cost MTA and straphangers millions” tells you what the author’s position is on the subject. Lets take a peak at what was said:
When in a hole, or a subway tunnel, keep digging.
That is what a state arbitrator seems determined to do with the MTA’s massive budget problems.
By awarding transit workers rich raises and smaller health care payments without productivity savings, one man is handing the agency huge and unsustainable costs.
And there’s nothing anyone can do. Except hold your breath and wait for the next fiscal collision, in the form of service cuts, fare hikes or both.
It’s coming down the express track.
The TWU now will enjoy three years of annual raises at 4%, 4% and 3%. Workers will no longer have to pay 1.5% health care premiums on wages for overtime earnings. And gone is the hope that finally, trains operated by one person would be approved on certain subway lines, saving tons on labor expenses.
This will create a $350 million deficit in an operating budget that was balanced only after a painful struggle that ended in a fare hike.
Zuccotti’s reason for the giveaway: The raises follow the pattern Mayor Bloomberg set with city unions.
Click here for the complete report.
During these tough economic times, I can understand that these raises provide sticker shock. However I think it is very unfortunate that hard working employees of the MTA will be treated as people undeserving of their raises. I also find it highly irresponsible for people to pass the buck of the MTA’s financial failure & deficit to the employees. Most are doing their job the right way & deserve to make money to match the needs of living in today’s world. If the finances of the MTA were not screwed by inept white collar individuals who mainly reside in Albany, fair raises such as these would not be such a hot button issue.
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Comments
The contract award is reasonable and fair – it is no more generous then the contracts given to other public workers. Despite all the bleating by anti people and anti labor fanatics the fact is that transit workers are low paid for providing a vital service! The pay is so low in fact that the MTA has big problems filling certain job titles because they can’t find anyone who is qualified that is willing to work for such low pay. Most of the anti labor naysayers could never qualify to take a civil service test let alone pass one.
Comment by Mary Jones — August 13, 2009 @ 7:45 pm
August 13, 2009
Where’s “Mayor Linsley” when you need him?
E.J. McMahon
Adjusting for inflation, the 11.3 percent pay hike awarded by an arbitration panel to Local 100 of the Transport Workers’ Union (TWU) this week appears to be the transit workers’ biggest score since the disastrously generous contract settlement that ended their 1966 strike. Indeed, by some measures, this year’s increase will be even larger.
Somewhere, he’s smiling
Somewhere, he’s smiling: the TWU’s Mike Quill
The 1966 deal cost $60 million–about $400 million in today’s dollars. This week’s arbitration award will cost $600 $465 million over three years. And that largely unbudgeted expense, when fully effective, will eat up nearly one-third one-fifth of the new payroll tax imposed under the MTA bailout.*
Of course, a lot has changed over the past 43 years. For example:
* In 1966, while the city’s economic strength was eroding, it was also benefiting from a strong national economy. Wages, personal income and employment were still growing, and Wall Street was booming. Today, New York is struggling to emerge from its deepest and sharpest economic downturn since the Great Depression. Much of Wall Street is in financial ruins, its largest survivors propped up by the federal government.
* In 1966, the subway system was run by the city, and Mayor John Lindsay–or “Linsley,” as then-TWU boss Mike Quill called him– could be personally held accountable for the bungled contract negotiations. Today, the transit system is part of a state-controlled authority. The MTA’s decision last fall to punt its largest and costliest labor agreement to arbitration conveniently leaves no one to hold accountable, other than the unelected “public” appointee to the arbitration panel–real estate lawyer and former deputy mayor John Zuccotti.
Revising from our post earlier this week, here’s a chart comparing the TWU arbitration award to current economic indicators and projections (from the city Office of Management and Budget):
CORRECTION: The base year for these three-year trend comparisons is 2008; thus the chart title should read “2008-11″
* This line originally was incorrect, because it conflated cumulative with annual costs. The annual cost of the pay raise will reach $272 million in 2011, according to the arbitrators’ opinion. This is 18 percent of the amount that the payroll tax is likely to be raising by then, assuming no significant next increase in total wages in region during the meantime.
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The contract award is reasonable and fair – it is no more generous then the contracts given to other public workers. Despite all the bleating by anti people and anti labor fanatics the fact is that transit workers are low paid for providing a vital service! The pay is so low in fact that the MTA has big problems filling certain job titles because they can’t find anyone who is qualified that is willing to work for such low pay. Most of the anti labor naysayers could never qualify to take a civil service test let alone pass one.
Comment by Mary Jones — August 13, 2009 @ 7:45 pm