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This is easier said than done though. Sometimes if u really need a job u just take what you are offered even if it's not ideal bc the flipside is being unemployed.
Also there is something to be said for doing what u love. LIRR are paid very well, great pension & dont pay into health which is unheard of - yeah I could work for them if i wanted - i got an offer but I wanted to do work i'm passionate about and my field is one that requires us to pay into healthcare.
We agreed to pay into our health care and will as of the date of signing of the new agreement. I was personally threatened at one job in corporate aviation by fellow employees for starting a grassroots campaign I had support and opposition from fellow employees. Although we didnt get enough cards signed to have an election the company did respond by raising the shift differential and giving the entire workforce an interm raise. Sure of of there good heart. This is what people dont get unions benefit you if you work for a living even when you arent a member. The mere thought of having to deal with one got everyone a 2 dollar an hour raise. This quickly squashed the drive but you see my point.
Status:
"Let this year be over..."
(set 19 days ago)
Location: Where my bills arrive
19,219 posts, read 17,085,392 times
Reputation: 15538
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dittodon
We are not public service workers, we are RR workers and the salary of the people who ride the train (unless they happen to work in a similar craft like electricians) have nothing to do with our pay. You seem to forget that we have a private sector to compare our wages and benefits to.
BTW your use of the word UNSUSTAINABLE (catch phrase) tells me you read too many headlines
"Our Union", "we" , "we sold out.." your posts read like a mindless propaganda machine. Can you ever just post what you think? not the collective brotherhood??
Reminds me a scene from Porky's 2 where the minister says "So sayeth the shepard" and the others respond "so sayeth the flock" is that what being part of the brotherhood is like....
I dont know about this. I just ran the numbers on my "raise" and adjusted for inflation I end up right back where I started except now I'm paying for medical and the new hires were sold out a bit. Is this the new world we middle class live in. Barely keep from falling backwards while slowly selling out the next generation. Somewhere someone is laughing at us all arguing over the pennies that we need slave away for.
Please, as a retiree who had the pleasure of the Oyster Bay line and the phenomenal service for 20 years, all I can say is welcome to our world. I would get raise and the LIRR would go up and my medical benefits rose yearly too. Net - Net, I was still behind the eight ball. I would go back to where ever home is and not attempt to convince us of what a raw deal you have. Of course, if everyone feels that way, they can always leave the RR and go for the brass ring outside!!!
Please, as a retiree who had the pleasure of the Oyster Bay line and the phenomenal service for 20 years, all I can say is welcome to our world. I would get raise and the LIRR would go up and my medical benefits rose yearly too. Net - Net, I was still behind the eight ball. I would go back to where ever home is and not attempt to convince us of what a raw deal you have. Of course, if everyone feels that way, they can always leave the RR and go for the brass ring outside!!!
Thats my point, everyones perception is that we are high on the hog, granted some idiots spent their entire existence chasing overtime but most of us average 80k with benefits and thats overtime included. Fighting tooth and nail to keep from sliding backwards Everything goes up around me as well.
I'm happy this is over.
This is a compromise between what the PEB decided and what the MTA offered. I don't think it's a raw deal, but then again it's not my deal. I know some guys aren't happy, but you can't make 'em all.
Oddly, no work rules were even discussed.
It's been a stressful time for all, longer for the employees than the public. I've been dealing with planning for a strike for months as a non union LIRR employee. I had no part in the passenger contingency plan, just to be clear. However, I've been preparing for the behind the scenes stuff since March or April.
For me a strike would have been 12 hr days, 7 days a week. So I'm relieved.
I get the anger from the public, however what bothers me most is the misinformation that's printed in places like Newsday and the Post, then taken for gospel.
Expensive, shoddy service, rude employees, old trains? I'm sorry, I won't deny or confirm your experiences. Is there room for improvement, certainly, always. It's not because of the majority of the employees, some maybe. Most care about what they do. I ride the trains too, see the interactions. I get lucky I suppose with the service, I work early, and stop in Jamaica. I know most of the problems are later, and into NY.
If they ever privately operated in in a NICE Bus type scenario, I might be replaced, I might not. I'll take it as a cue to leave NY and go work for a class I elsewhere. Also I doubt you'd be happy with the result. There's a reason there's no private passenger rail.
The MTA attack ads made me sick, I hate nothing more than political campaign ads. This had the exact same ring.
So all this BS and there really wasn't much of a difference between what the MTA offered and what was settled on?
What was the posturing from the union about? Basically they split the difference between 6 and 7 years and got 6.5 year contract. This was worth losing public support for the workers?
Me thinks the union needs some smarter heads running the show. Funny, after all the money your union gave Cuomo and here he goes and gets you to settle for just about what the MTA offer was.
I'm happy this is over.
This is a compromise between what the PEB decided and what the MTA offered. I don't think it's a raw deal, but then again it's not my deal. I know some guys aren't happy, but you can't make 'em all.
Oddly, no work rules were even discussed.
It's been a stressful time for all, longer for the employees than the public. I've been dealing with planning for a strike for months as a non union LIRR employee. I had no part in the passenger contingency plan, just to be clear. However, I've been preparing for the behind the scenes stuff since March or April.
For me a strike would have been 12 hr days, 7 days a week. So I'm relieved.
I get the anger from the public, however what bothers me most is the misinformation that's printed in places like Newsday and the Post, then taken for gospel.
Expensive, shoddy service, rude employees, old trains? I'm sorry, I won't deny or confirm your experiences. Is there room for improvement, certainly, always. It's not because of the majority of the employees, some maybe. Most care about what they do. I ride the trains too, see the interactions. I get lucky I suppose with the service, I work early, and stop in Jamaica. I know most of the problems are later, and into NY.
If they ever privately operated in in a NICE Bus type scenario, I might be replaced, I might not. I'll take it as a cue to leave NY and go work for a class I elsewhere. Also I doubt you'd be happy with the result. There's a reason there's no private passenger rail.
The MTA attack ads made me sick, I hate nothing more than political campaign ads. This had the exact same ring.
Just my $.02
My feeling is telling the riders you care about them but then threatening to strike, inconveniencing them isnt caring about them.
I'd rather have them say they just dont give 2 hoots about us.
My feeling is telling the riders you care about them but then threatening to strike, inconveniencing them isnt caring about them.
I'd rather have them say they just dont give 2 hoots about us.
They couldn't give less than a rat's turd about the riders --- or the so-called "unborn". Had they not gotten their way, the 300K plus riders would have been screwed while these clowns were sitting at home enjoying some time off (with pay, of course).
They're only concerned with their raises, their free (or practically free) benefits and pensions. And guess who is going to pay for it? Yep, THE RIDERS. Do they care that we're going to be paying a fare increase yet OUR salaries aren't going up? Most of us are paying our own benefits and pensions and we're not getting a 17% raise (or whatever they got). Nor are we getting a boatload of money in back pay.
I'm glad the strike isn't happening but for these clods to say they "care" about the ridership is the biggest bunch of crap I've ever heard!
I personally feel like every day the people in this area are always just one straw away from breaking the camel's back. Some days, it's harder to justify staying here and paying what we pay to make what we make and live how we live, but other days, I'm perfectly content to be 15 minutes away from the beach and less than 10 minutes away from my friends/family.
I'm recently married and getting ready to start a family and always feel like I need to be so careful with my money and careful with who I vote for and whether they just want me to dig deeper into my own pockets, etc. I know this is super personal, but I battle with the thought of leaving to move to a different state where I don't have to ride the train for 3 hours a day or only own 1 car because we can't comfortably afford a mortgage along with two cars and $300/ month in public transportation. IT'S CRAZY! When I write it all down, I think "of course you should leave!" But then the thought of quitting my job and living somewhere totally foreign is terrifying.
I guess for me, the strike was that straw. I'm all for working hard - I've always been that way. But when you're working so hard and it's just not enough, and then you have to pay more to get less, it's just maddening.
I never valued money as much as I do now, because I feel like everyone is after it. We're always chasing the dollar and concerned with who wants more of our dollars. Makes me feel like it's a terrible way to live.
This all seems to convienent from being far apart --- "gulf" and "gap" on Monday to a deal today....
Being cynical, almost feel like this whole thing was pre-planned on all sides to do all this and Cuomo to swoop in a broker a "deal", one already done days or weeks ago...... and that they were all really having pizza and playing poker in the law office meeting room.
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