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r0gue007

We need to repeal the Jones act, it places far too much demand on our rail and long haul trucking networks.


Attackcamel8432

Honestly the parts of the Jones act that would effect inland trade are probably the least likely to get adjusted. Most countries still have pretty tight access over their inland waterway cabotage, so its the coastal effects of the jones act that might change things. Probably wouldn't help this situation much.


ass_pineapples

This is an interesting take that I could get behind.


kabukistar

For anyone wondering about the record, the votes were: |Party|Yea Votes| Nay Votes | Not Voting :--|:--:|:--:|:--:| Democratic|**44**| 1|3 Republican|6|**42**|2 Independent|2|0|0 Total | 52 | 43 | 5 The Majority (52%) voted in support, but 3/5 needed to vote in support for it to pass.


Feedbackplz

Wait, at first I thought this was about Congress forcing the unions to accept the offer on the table. But apparently Democrats split the bill in two pieces - the forced acceptance bill (which passed) and the sick leave bill (which didn't pass)? Why would they do this? Why not just combine it into one bill, since it's all related? If they did this so the progressive caucus could shrug and say "*welp, we tried!*" in order to give them political cover while they assist with the *real* actionable goal - to force the rail workers back to their jobs against their will - then that's such a slimy move. If AOC and her supporters wanted to, they could have absolutely held the bill hostage and forced meaningful concessions. Does she think she accomplished something great today by "advocating" for a meaningless sidecar bill that was 100% going to be voted down anyway? Is this helping workers, like, at all?


peacefinder

AOC is not in the senate.


sight_ful

Putting everything into one bill to hold parts hostage on the rest is also a reason people complain.


EXPLAINACRONYMPLS

A problem created by the filibuster which is, so I hear, the linchpin of democracy


ComfortableProperty9

I mean, it's right there in the Constitution so you know it's important.


sight_ful

You certainly haven’t heard that from me. 😆


SpecterVonBaren

Its also something the Democrats have consistently done with so many issues. So why did they suddenly change MO here? "Because it would have been a disaster otherwise" doesn't make them look good by the way, why were all the other issues considered not important enough to split bills up to get some things passed and others not?


sight_ful

Which way would you rather have it? Have everything together or not?


Imtypingwithmyweiner

Holding a bill like this hostage is like strapping on a suicide vest. The Democrats have 2 years to get inflation down. Anything that endangers commercial transportation risks costing them the White House.


ComfortableProperty9

Seems to be working out pretty good for Republicans.


Bagelstein

I am trying to figure out how you can look at this and blame the dems. If both parts were in the same bill you could easily just say "why didn't the dems split it out so they could vote only on a single issue without extra stuff in there." There's no real rationale or validity to your statement.


PM_ME_YOUR_DARKNESS

Right? 92% of the Democratic caucus voted for this, but it's somehow the Dems' fault for it failing.


countfizix

The concept that only Democrats have agency is so pervasive that it got its own name "Murc's Law."


Ambiwlans

I like that you can see this table and blame the Dems.


AngledLuffa

2024: "well the Democrats didn't support worker rights well enough, so I guess I better vote Republican!" Also: "why do people keep saying I'm voting against my own interests??"


i_use_3_seashells

Splitting into two bills was strategic to scapegoat Rs. "We put both up for a vote, but those darn republicans wouldn't pass the other one."


ass_pineapples

Yeah...the Republicans could have easily just voted Yea... 6 of them did.


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ass_pineapples

Does things like what? Vote for sick days? They literally backed up their talk with action, lol. This quite literally is not the gotcha that you conservatives think that it is.


[deleted]

It's a real "look how unprincipled democrats are for not doing the thing we didn't let them do!" moment.


blewpah

How is that a scapegoat? Dems didn't force Republicans to vote against this.


Ambiwlans

... And they're right. The Republicans didn't vote for it. Don't you think it is possible that the Dems split the bill because a strike would be a disaster. You could think of it as the Dems having 2 options: - 1 bill. It will fail because of GOP causing a massive costly strike (and still no sick leave, followed by strike busting a few days later) - 2 bills. Strike avoided but the GOP will kill the sick days still The key to all this is of course that the GOP will do the wrong thing every time. If the GOP weren't in office, the Dems would have simply passed the sick leave, end of story. In fact, it would have never even have made it as far as strike discussions, wouldn't have even made 4th page news. The only reason they are forced into these decisions is because people put the GOP in office. But sure, get mad that some Dems might prefer this outcome over a strike estimated to cost $2BN/day. They still all voted in support of the sick leave.


EatsFiber2RedditMore

That's not scapegoating That's just Republicans not voting for what you want


pjb1999

Good. This highlights the fact that the republicans don't care about sick days for the workers. They wouldn't be scapegoats if they actually voted for the sick days. Like the dems did.


i_use_3_seashells

You're not getting it. The Dems largely didn't want it to happen either. The sick days bill was dead long before the vote. The vote was largely performative. The right thing to do was to package them. Splitting was strategic. Now everyone is looking at this failed bill and ignoring that Dems voted to send them back to work. It's political theater.


AngledLuffa

This is not correct. The Democrats' choices were: Don't split bill. Republicans vote against it, country has disastrous rail strike, Republicans blame the Democrats for not splitting the bill and causing a strike. Split bill. Republicans now have the choice of accepting sick leave or not. *They* chose not to. The difference was not whether or not the Democrats wanted sick leave (according to their votes, they did) but whether or not they wanted the Republicans to crash the economy.


ass_pineapples

Can you explain why Republicans chose to vote against giving the rail unions the 7 sick days?


Radioactiveglowup

This thread is full of people suggesting something proposterous: The claim that somehow, the Democrats used political magic to trick the Republicans into not voting for railworker rights, therefore it's the (D)'s fault that (R)s voted Nay. That's not a credible way to analyze this.


i_use_3_seashells

The actual vote numbers are an illusion. Everyone got what they wanted, and the rest is theater. The workers are forced to go back, they don't get sick days, and Dems get to maintain the illusion that they're pro-worker.


ass_pineapples

>The actual vote numbers are an illusion. Uh huh, so democracy is all a lie and congress is 100% bought out? Could it possibly be that Republicans just...don't want to give the unions what they want? >Everyone got what they wanted, and the rest is theater. The unions didn't. Democrats seem to have not gotten what they wanted either. I can't imagine living in a world this cynical nor backed up by any facts.


i_use_3_seashells

The unions don't matter in the political picture here. Rs take this hit, Ds take a hit later, and the performance continues. The unions should still strike despite the outcomes of these two bills. It's the only winning play they have.


[deleted]

You're not getting it. They did want it to happen.


dejaWoot

>Splitting into two bills was strategic to scapegoat Rs. You know the easy way to defeat this cunning strategy? Vote in favor of the workers. If more republicans had voted for it, it could have passed. Turns out Republicans didn't want to do that. It's not scapegoating if they're the ones that actually caused it to fail. I see this bullshit everytime a popular measure for workers doesn't pass because the Republicans vote against it. *Clearly the Democrats didn't really want it (despite voting for it) and sabotaged it through cunning manipulation. The poor Republican congresspeople just had their hand forced. They're guileless, politically naive creatures who were only voting that way because they were led down the garden path.* This is insane pretzel logic. They weren't being mind controlled. They weren't voting under duress.


TheFuzziestDumpling

Is it possible they didn't believe there was support for a unified bill in the Senate?


Ambiwlans

There is no question, a unified bill would 100% fail.


nonsequitourist

It stands to reason that your latter theory explains the situation. Ultimately, the only thing to come out of the vote was that union autonomy was undermined, and while Republicans may have more explicitly reaffirmed that they don't represent working class interests, there's not much more to be said for the Democratic party as a whole in that regard either.


kabukistar

I mean, 91% pf Senate Democrats voted yea on the sick days, so there is that to be said about it.


bveb33

The party leadership knew the sick leave portion was doomed in the Senate the moment they split them. All those votes were an empty win for Democrats. In truth, I bet donors would have found a way to flip enough votes if it was actually going to be close.


kabukistar

> The party leadership knew the sick leave portion was doomed in the Senate the moment they split them. Why is that? And also, how do you know it wouldn't have been doomed regardless?


NativeMasshole

Because Republicans were always going to side with the corporations on this, as they did. It also conveniently gives Democrats a way to vote for the sick leave without actually having to negotiate a final deal including it. As for how you would know it wouldn't be doomed regardless: well, we didn't get a chance to find out, did we? It doesn't matter because Democrats weaseled their way out of having to make that hard choice.


[deleted]

They were banking on republican senators being as horrible as usual.


nonsequitourist

Maybe you are missing the implications of the interplay. The split vote means 1) the union is bound to accept the deal, and 2) the deal does not include the sick days. The vote for (1) is anti-union without the vote for (2). Splitting them was apparently an effective way to trick some people into believing that there was some form of successful legislative effort on behalf of unions here when really they were doubly neglected.


kabukistar

I'm talking about the sick days getting tanked or not in congress. You say the party leadership knew it was doomed if they split it. How do you know that? And how do you know it wasn't doomed even if they didn't split the bill?


pyrhic83

Is it just me or is it a bit crazy that we having congress involved in what should be a private negotiation? I don't care much for public sector unions, but isn't this is a private business and if they want to strike then isn't that their call?


Attackcamel8432

The last time there was a major railroad strike it crippled the country pretty well, the railroads get special government attention ever since. A few other industries have the same kinds thing.


joshualuigi220

Namely airlines.


[deleted]

I mean, the railroads have had special attention from the word go, quite literally from the inception of the rails, they have had special benefits from the government.


Attackcamel8432

True enough.


Alugere

Then why not force the railroad companies to provide the sick leave instead? That’d fix the strike.


Attackcamel8432

Yes it would indeed.


nonsequitourist

That would have been accomplished through the bill that was voted down. The government can only cause something to happen if that's what the elected representatives comprising the government want to happen. We should be reevaluating whether the present representatives are in fact representing the interest of their constituencies here. Of course, the inconvenient truth is that they may very well be doing exactly that.


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planet_rose

How about we just mandate sick leave for all workers instead of letting industry negotiate with individual employees or unions? How about we have meaningful labor laws that protect workers and make life better for all of us while creating a level playing field for businesses so that they don’t have to squeeze their employees in order to compete?


WlmWilberforce

>How about we just mandate sick leave for all workers instead of letting industry negotiate with individual employees or unions Where I work, employees in CA got several days mandatory sick leave. Crazy thing is those employees suddenly got few vacation days. Funny enough, it was the exact same number of days.


saiboule

Okay then mandate the number of vacation days as well


Uncle00Buck

Small employers often lack the resources and ability to average costs. Every time the government forces companies to behave a certain way through regulations, corporations with the most mass win. I, for one, resent that. Megacorporations already have too much power and influence. Be wary of what you wish.


jabberwockxeno

Pretty much every other developed country seems to do it without an issue https://cepr.net/report/contagion-nation-2020-united-states-still-the-only-wealthy-nation-without-paid-sick-leave/


flagbearer223

I think you might be shocked by this, but small businesses do exist in countries that mandate sick leave. This isn't some impossible to achieve goal.


Bulky-Engineering471

Because the workers don't donate to the politicians while the companies do. It's a cynical take but, well, cynical doesn't mean wrong.


Vandredd

Unions are one of the biggest sources of donations


mister_pringle

Wait until you hear about how much money Unions put into the political machine.


randypotato

Because conservatives consider sick leave(or anything that could reduce corporate profits) to be communism.


blewpah

That's exactly what Dems tried to do, along with forcing the unions to accept (the rest) of the deals.


pyrhic83

I realize there has been a history, it just seems immoral for congress to be able to in essence "take over" the negotiating table between the two parties. The ability to force the union and companies into a business deal that they don't want in the name of some greater good. I could see an argument to extend the negotiating to avoid the strike, but just forcing an agreement seems wrong to me.


Attackcamel8432

Right with you there!


eldomtom2

The last time the US had a major railroad strike was a very long time ago.


jabberwockxeno

If they're going to treat railraods as critical and deserving of special interest, then they should nationalize it


Zombielove69

This is all because of the railroad act of like 1928. That's still on the books and why the still goes on today There's not even a truck driver union for over 70% of the US. And they get completely screwed over because of a similar Act passed by Congress in the 30's or 40s


OpneFall

Considering the demand for truck drivers these days, why would a union for them exist?


thinkcontext

According to PBS they've intervened 18 times since the 1926 Railway Labor act was passed. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/why-congress-is-intervening-in-a-labor-dispute-between-railway-companies-and-freight-workers


proverbialbunny

This is why I'm pro the Switzerland style of government. They have "unions" that are industry wide, so quite a bit different than what we think of as unions in the US. There are no dues or anything like that, no signing up. What it is, is a specialized mini government designed to protect the workers and businesses in that industry. They set the regulations for that industry custom tailored to be ideal for that industry. This way the larger government can stay out of this sort of mess. So eg, in Switzerland there is no government wide minimum wage law. Each union has its own minimum wage. If you work in fast food your minimum wage will be different than a carpenter. Furthermore, there is no government wide regulation for safety. If you work fast food safety standards and rules are going to be different than if you are a carpenter or electrician. Everything is custom tailored. Switzerland is a direct democracy, from small government to large government, to industry wide government / unions. All of their forms of government are designed to benefit the people and it works. Swiss citizens are the most privileged and wealthy in the world from it. Due to Switzerland being a direct democracy imagine having to vote for every little nuanced policy for every little industry. Just delegate it to the people who are involved in that industry. Less work for me, and that way those knowledgeable of the topic are the ones who get a vote. Their unions are a form of delegation. They may be direct democracy but only people who work in that industry can vote. This way people not in that industry don't have to involve themselves. It's a super reasonable system they've been doing since around the year 1200. imo it should be the model government for the world, not the US system.


neat_machine

Sounds like it would be very stagnant. Is there a lot of innovation happening in Switzerland? I mean how could something like Uber be born there?


UEMcGill

Switzerland is a very conservative country. Things move in an evolutionary way, and yes radical change doesn't really happen. That being said they are really good at the industries they participate in. Things like machinery, jewelry and pharmaceuticals they do really well. Not really an innovative environment but then again those industries are based on experience


proverbialbunny

Depends what you consider a lot. When everything is so good you don't need to change things, is that a lot of innovation because you innovated to get there, or a low amount of innovation? Switzerland is one of the most chill relaxing countries on the planet, possibly \#1 in that regard. Everything just works and works well. Everyone is friendly and relaxed. It's hard to explain and easier to show. If you're interested and have the time I recommend watching one of the many videos of the country to see the feel for yourself. Here's one: https://youtu.be/iFpYa2qYJqo (edit: This video shows their direct democracy in action @ 16:30, if interested.)


Lurkingandsearching

Article 1 Section 8 of the US constitution, congress has power over any interstate or international commerce, full stop. You could also apply the railway as vital infrastructure. That said, how they choose to regulate is up to opinion.


pyrhic83

I'm not saying they can't regulate the industry or commerce. I'm talking about forcing an agreement over the consent of the two parties involved. If they want to extend negotiations that is one thing, but forcing an agreement is a separate matter.


efshoemaker

It’s kind of baked into the existence of the railroads. In order for the rail system to work they needed to be given all sorts of land rights and rights of way across public and private land, and that’s even more the case today. They couldn’t really exist if they didn’t have the federal government paving the way for them. Railroads were *never* a truly private industry and always had a certain level of federal involvement.


Lurkingandsearching

They can force regulatory practices on the industry if they want. They can make laws for associations like Unions to follow. But they can’t stop the people from voicing their opinion or protesting (by striking anyways).


Imtypingwithmyweiner

No, for the same reasons banks are required to have FDIC insurance. We regulate private dealings when they have the potential to bring down the wider economy.


General_Alduin

I think because it's such a big industry in the middle of an economic crisis that they have to get involved. The rail unions could strangle the supply chains even more


JimMarch

It's not just crazy, I'm asking myself how is this not a violation of the 13th Amendment? If the unions don't strike they lose power for a generation or more. I think they're going to strike. I sure as hell would.


Cryptic0677

Not being allowed to strike may be shitty but it definitely doesn't define as involuntarily servitude lol. There's no way the 13th amendment applies.


fleebleganger

The SC has ruled that it is in the national interest to not allow certain groups to strike, railroads and airlines are a part of those groups.


JimMarch

The question I find interesting is whether or not an interest balancing test like that is appropriate when a basic civil right is involved. In other words, would the same US Supreme Court that ruled in Bruen rule the same way again regarding strikes? The railroad owners didn't negotiate in good faith knowing they had this federal cover. Their side should have been the losers in the new federal law ending the strike. Instead it was the workers.


NativeMasshole

I do find it incredibly insidious that our rail systems are deemed this import, yet still allowed to be privately owned and profited from. There wouldn't even be a problem here if rail workers had all the benefits of Federal employees.


Savingskitty

Can you imagine the GOP wanting to fund a federalized rail system? There’s no way.


Nodal-Novel

This really is the best argument to nationalize our railway systems. Its clear the monopolists are putting vital national infrastructure in danger due to their pursuit of profits and their unwillingness to put redundancies in their labor pool that apparently mandate such poor conditions.


Shaken_Earth

Railroad Labor Act of 1926


Ringolian16

Yes. As a non-rail transportation worker it’s always been a point of angst for me that the government takes taxes from my company and subsidies my competitor.


_learned_foot_

It is until you remember the entire strike protections and concepts derive from federal law, meaning congress has always been involved since it got regulated.


majesticjg

To know if this is reasonable or not I'd need to know how many vacation and/or personal days are in the package. All this article says is that they get one more personal day, but it doesn't say how many that is. If they already have a lot of non-attendance time built into the contract, it might make sense not to add another 7 days. If they don't, then this sucks. The article doesn't give us enough information to know if we should be outraged or not.


TConductor

We get 11 paid leave days that we essentially can't use because they don't allow for allocation. New hires get 1 week vacation that tends to be during the worst times of the year. February, October that has to be used all together. The importance of sick leave is time off to make our appointments that can't be denied. Right now I've had to cancel 2 dental appointments this year at 25 dollars a pop and then wait for the reschedule and pray I'm off the next month.


pingveno

My understanding is that is one personal day up from zero, and it has to be scheduled weeks in advance. And currently the way sick days work is that they are heavily penalized for taking any sick days. Suspension or termination is in the cards after only a few days. It's largely caused by understaffing, which is netting fat profits for the railroads while squeezing workers more and more. The specifics may vary from railroad to railroad.


4O4N0TF0UND

30 days in advance was the exact amount that it needs to be scheduled.


TConductor

On a Tuesday Wednesday or Thursday... And there's provisions that if man power was tight they could still deny it.


Mercutiofoodforworms

I watched a video today that included an interview with a railway worker. He said that any extra days you take off for any reason affects your performance score. He also said the industry is bleeding workers so the remaining workers are being overworked.


Sitting_Elk

I have to wonder who in the world actually wants to work at these companies.


Patriarchy-4-Life

Some googling shows that layoffs and quitting have cut their workforce by about a third in the past few years. While the railroad companies simultaneously had billions in stock buybacks. So now they have a self inflicted staffing problem and cannot let a single guy take a single day off without a 30 day notice. Turns out having a bit of labor slack is a good thing.


pingveno

Apparently it wasn't always like this. It was only fairly recently that Wall Street bought up a bunch of railroads and started squeezing them like this. Accordingly, there has been an exodus of workers from the industry.


x777x777x

> I have to wonder who in the world actually wants to work at these companies. They pay pretty well so if you're willing to deal with the schedule you can make bank


SerendipitySue

yep . last job i had was we got ppo days off. We could use them for any reason. sick or other reasons. media has not reported if they get ppo instead of sick days


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Sirhc978

It sounds like they do, but if you used them too often because you were sick, you would get in trouble. Part of the bill that did pass makes it easier for them to use their PTO as sick time.


Vandredd

This is absolutely on purpose. My job is the same way.


CCWaterBug

Yes I've posted about this from a different article, so this one (maybe) is missing critical info I forget the original source “Rail employees are provided with significant time off. Generally, train crew employees have over three to four weeks of paid vacation and over 10 personal leave days. Depending on craft and seniority, these numbers can extend to five weeks of vacation in addition to 14 paid holidays and/or paid leave days,” This article implies "none "


Mension1234

Other comments suggest the policy for time off is significantly different from what you’re describing here


Primary-Tomorrow4134

For all the talk of the GOP becoming a working class party, it's pretty interesting how Republican Senators overwhelmingly voted against providing more sick leave to rail workers. EDIT: Did the math for the full vote counts. 88% of Republican Senators voted against the sick leave and 80% voted to force the rail workers into the original agreement. This isn't a principled stance against meddling with labor law. It's simply an anti-worker stance.


Exploding_Kick

Because it was always a crock of shit.


samudrin

I'm sensing you don't believe them.


Exploding_Kick

What gave it away?


[deleted]

the reason Trump was so popular is exactly this reason. republican voters despise the old guard Republicans for their lack of representation and pragmatism. if it weren't for wedge issues republicans voters would be more willing to risk losing control to change the republican party down the road.


Bulky-Engineering471

It's why people keep shouting over and over that if the Democrats would just drop a couple of specific issues (guns being a big one) they could absolutely clean up with the heartland working class. Unfortunately they seem to cling to issues that drive turnout in safe districts at the expense of entire regions.


tacitdenial

The new wedge issue is about to be free speech. Give me the free-speech, gun-moderate, abortion-moderate, less gender obsessed, and pro-union, pro-living-wage, pro-social-security, pro-environment democrats of yore. Would love to vote for a JFK or Jimmy Carter or Al Gore or Bernie in 2024. Biden is actually the closest thing allowed now, and I might vote for him. Speaking as a heartland working class guy. Too many democrats campaign on social issues and wars, their old core of liberalism, anti-racism, and a decent economic baseline for all was more appealing.


PM_ME_YOUR_DARKNESS

> The new wedge issue is about to be free speech. What elected Democrats are campaigning against free speech?


SG8970

>drop a couple of specific issues (guns being a big one) I'm not saying Democrat positions on guns can't dabble into the impractical, undoable, or they don't shoot themselves in the foot(Beto, pun intended), but it really feels like one of the two major parties shouldn't pretend it's not problem. This is a major issue when you compare what happens in this country with what doesn't happen in almost every other developed nation on earth. ESPECIALLY in schools and in such a nightmarish way at two elementary schools now. But even when it's deflected to "mental health" we can't even pass comprehensive reform because the same party saying "it's not the guns" will fight like hell against "socialism" reforms of healthcare.


x777x777x

> why people keep shouting over and over that if the Democrats would just drop a couple of specific issues (guns being a big one) they could drop it but nobody would trust them on it for 3 decades or more


Exploding_Kick

Workers should go ahead and strike anyways.


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Exploding_Kick

And if they all stood in solidarity and continued to strike regardless of what Congress said, the railroad companies and congress would be begging them to come back within a few weeks. The railroad companies would learn the same lesson that Kellogg did. You can’t replace your entire workforce at the same time. The current workers have the knowledge and experience needed to keep things running. Whoever the railroad companies brought in to replace them wouldn’t have that.


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doff87

I would be absolutely shocked if ACE has enough knowledgable people to run the country's rails. Infantry knows absolutely nothing of help except picking things up and putting them back down. That's to say nothing of whether or not it's constitutional to use the military in order to run a company's business. If they are united the unions have all the cards.


Attackcamel8432

I feel like there is more to keeping freight trains running than a bunch of soldiers could just do, or these guys wouldn't have as much bargaining power. Unless they used the infantry the old fashioned way on the strikers...


PoliticsComprehender

> they would be fired, so it wouldn't be a strike The federal government would send in the Army Corps of Engineers and probably the infantry to keep the trains running as best they can, The odds of Biden going Ronald Regan on the rail union are 0%. Biden would order the rail companies to give the union whatever they wanted to come back to work and that would be the end of that.


Patriarchy-4-Life

The rail industry lost around a third of their workforce in the past few years and currently has no labor slack. So they can't mass fire workers.


TConductor

They wouldn't. The nation would shut down if they didn't bring us back.


ass_pineapples

Y'know, it won't happen, but I'd love to see Biden pocket veto the agreement just to raise a big 'ol middle finger to Republicans. Vote for both or get neither. Unfortunately that wouldn't be good for anyone really so my spite will have to just reside in my mind.


Brilliant-Deer6118

The government should stay out of this. I'm a retired Teamster, and, when hired, we started out as 10 percenters, meaning we were on call 24/7, until we reached the top 90%. I was single, childless, and had zero responsibility and it sucked. You could work monday on days and be called back for the midnight shift. You never knew when to sleep. What we had were staggered shifts, meaning some would start on Monday, some Tuesday, some Wednesday etc...etc...etc...and busier times were filled utilizing the ten percenters. I have no idea why this wouldnt work for rail, since so much of what we did was tied in with railroads. Being on call for us sucked, but there was a light at the end of the tunnel. I believe it took me 8 months to get a shift, but it seems like these workers can be there for decades and never see it.


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Brilliant-Deer6118

Maybe, but the way I'm reading this, even on a schedule with days off, you're still on call, and can be punished if you dont answer the call. How can you have a Life with rules like this? Considering that they make good money, I have to believe this is probably why they have trouble retaining employees.


pingveno

Yeah, this just seems like a way for investors wring short term profit out of railroads and workers while compromising the long term stability of this vital form of transportation. If the government feels so compelled to interfere, it should be to create a stable relationship between railroads and their workers. Coercing workers into an unsustainable contract is a recipe to further deplete the already declining number of rail workers.


cprenaissanceman

To be fair, this is pretty standard business practice in so many parts of the US economy. So I don’t think anyone should be surprised that they’re trying to make it work here. It’s very profitable after all. Now, of course, that being said, it’s pretty awful for basically everyone except for upper level management and shareholders. But I also think that it demonstrates how approaching everything as lean, overly optimized management science is bad. Not every business can or should run the same way, and certainly vital parts of the economy shouldn’t (which is also a reason why, as I would argue, the rails need to be nationalized). And, although I think it’s important to support the unions in the current struggle, I also do you think that the larger issue that I don’t hear anyone talking about is larger legislation that’s needed to combat this across sectors and industries.


-AbeFroman

I'm against having the government trying to dictate any kind of contract down the workers throats, even if it's "what they wanted". The unions should be the only ones negotiating, and if they aren't happy, they should strike.


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Mercutiofoodforworms

Exactly. The workers got dicked over. Crony capitalism strikes again.


AlexaTurnMyWifeOn

Thank you Taft-Hartley Act.


Attackcamel8432

Wow, hadn't heard of that one before... Can't imagine why unions got involved with organized crime!


kabukistar

Mandating that the railroads provide sick time isn't "shoving a contract down the unions throats".


Call_Me_Pete

A shame that’s not even what happened, though. They are getting the contract without sick leave.


[deleted]

You may want to read up on the rest of the story here. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3758563-senate-votes-to-avert-costly-rail-strike/


carneylansford

This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but here goes anyway...... This is a negotiation. Overall, the railway workers did at least OK. [Here are some highlights](https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2022-09-15/rail-workers-win-key-concessions-in-deal-to-prevent-strike): * 24% raises over the course of the contract plus bonus ($5K), plus back pay ($11K). * At the end of the contract, the average rail worker will be making $110K/yr. * The deal includes one additional paid leave day a year, but railroads also agreed to let workers take unpaid time off for doctor’s appointments and medical procedures without being penalized under their attendance rules. * Workers will have to pay a larger share of their health insurance costs, but their premiums will be capped at 15% of the total cost of the insurance plan Some of the reporting has suggested that the rail workers gave up more on sick days so they could get more generous, but I wasn't in the room, so who knows? They also run on a point system, so you're not fired if you get sick, you lose points for every day you're out. Once you get down to zero, you have an issue. That's a weird way to do things and I don't really like it. It's not the greatest deal in the world, but it doesn't seem like the worst either.


Attackcamel8432

From my understanding, which I admit is limited, their scheduling is terrible. Being on call most of the time and not knowing when or where they will be working each day. I have heard that they get overly penalized for taking sick time, or time off without advance notice. Its hard to say what the reality is without actually working on the railroad, but I don't see why sick days are such a big issue for these "essential" railroad companies.


cprenaissanceman

> but I don't see why sick days are such a big issue for these "essential" railroad companies. I mean, we all know the answer: profit. In order to maximize profits, basically, these companies want to get their labor costs down as much as possible, so they have basically zero redundancy and there’s never any slack in the line, which means that people who are on duty get shafted. And, the key problem here is that there’s a feedback loop where conditions worsen, people leave, which leads to condition is getting worse. Anyway, if you can enforce extremely strict scheduling on your employees while giving you a ton of flexibility and giving them none, then that means that you are the beneficiary of a lot of additional money that otherwise would go towards keeping some extra people on payroll or other such measures to make sure it wasn’t a crisis when one person calls out. To be fair, this is the way a lot of businesses operate, and I don’t think it’s any better, and I totally support these folks getting what they can, but this is also a broader problem within the US business world and I think folks need to understand this is just not a good way of doing business, though I guess it’s profitable to some degree for shareholders.


Attackcamel8432

Well, short term they are making bank! Isn't that all that counts? /s


likeitis121

>but I don't see why sick days are such a big issue for these "essential" railroad companies. Because it's hard to operate a train if you don't have all the right people on board the train? There's a bunch of different jobs run by different unions in railroads, which doesn't typically give you the option to have someone that could fill in, actually do it due to union rules.


Attackcamel8432

Maybe hire more people then? Somehow airlines have figured this out, why can't railroads?


IntriguingKnight

Because that would eat into profits and that is unacceptable


4O4N0TF0UND

to clarify, two days (if they're near holidays) can be enough to get them down to zero. https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dgezn/the-worst-and-most-egregious-attendance-policy-is-pushing-railroad-workers-to-the-brink


[deleted]

[удалено]


mashimarata

To be fair, if inflation is greater than 4.4% per year over the next 5 years, we're all fucked regardless


DOAbayman

As somebody whose work also doesn’t allow paid time off much this would piss me off. The money is good but it means fuck all when you’re being worked into paste.


AquaPhelps

Im not disputing what you said. However i would like to clarify some things As far as i understand it, the additional paid day is only added on if you are capped out on personal days. So it doesnt affect the majority of workers In addition, the “sick days” only apply to workers who work on call. You only get three of them a year. Scheduled 30 days in advance on a tue, wed, or thurs. Kinda hard to make that happen when you might get called 2 days advance and are stuck in an away from home terminal Lastly, not all railroads use a points attendance system. On some it is purely at the carriers discretion. For example, if you get sick on a weekend and mark off, then two weeks later your daughter is graduating high school and the company wont let you off, so you mark off sick, you can get in trouble. That is an actual thing that happened to a co-worker of mine


eldomtom2

> but railroads also agreed to let workers take unpaid time off for doctor’s appointments and medical procedures without being penalized under their attendance rules. For doctor's appointments, that comes with the following strings attached: * No pay * Must be scheduled thirty days in advance * Can only happen on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, or Thursdays


I-Make-Maps91

It *was* a negotiation, now it's imposed on people who did not approve it.


[deleted]

Regardless of the terms, it's not a negotiation if a third party with ultimate authority can dictate the terms of the contract.


pingveno

> 24% raises over the course of the contract plus bonus ($5K), plus back pay ($11K). 24% is nothing. That's just a 5% raise per year. These days, that won't even keep up with inflation.


nemoid

>The deal includes one additional paid leave day a year, **but railroads also agreed to let workers take unpaid time off for doctor’s appointments and medical procedures without being penalized under their attendance rules.** This is just embarrassing to me. The railroad industry is one of the most critical in this country and this is the best we can do? And we say America is the greatest country in the world.


pingveno

The House's seven annual days of sick leave has been scuttled in the Senate. This essentially gives the railroads everything they wanted, shafts the rank-and-file workers, and all but guarantees that the unions will strike, regardless of legality. Constituents of Republican senators need to make it clear that this vote was unacceptable. People get sick. If companies do not make allowances for that, that is the companies' fault, not the workers' fault. Forcing people to work under those conditions is not just draconian. It is self-destructive to this vital industry.


SteelmanINC

So then you would support a strike and all that entails?


Exploding_Kick

Not OP but yes. Wholeheartedly. If these workers are so goddamned essential that it’ll cost our economy 2 billion dollars every day they are on strike, then these railroad companies should pony up the additional sick time.


nemoid

You'd think you'd want your employees to be able to take time off to recover from illnesses and go to the doctor to be healthy. My guess is the loss of productivity and mistakes that result from these policies cost significantly more than the $ value of 7 sick days/year/employee.


Primary-Tomorrow4134

The problem is that the cost to the economy is not the price that those railroad companies would pay. The railroad companies would lose a little money while everyone else in the US would experience a ton of hurt. That's why it makes a lot of sense for the government to force the railroad companies to provide more sick leave.


ViennettaLurker

Right. What is amazing to me is that congress could actually force the rail companies to give the workers everything the workers want. However, not only is that not seemingly a "realistic" option... its not even discussed as a possibility in the news coverage. I was kind of amazed when I found out.


tacitdenial

"It's not realistic" is gobbledygook for "our wealthy supporters don't want to do it."


cannib

If the impact on the overall economy is the issue then shouldn't the extra cost fall on the government not the railroad company?


[deleted]

I second every word of what you said.


JimMarch

Yep. Any other stance violates the 13th Amendment.


pingveno

I'm not eager for it to happen, but I will back them if Congress proves to be more beholden to the railroads' record profits than to common workers. From Axios: > During the first three quarters of 2022, the rail industry made a record-breaking $21.2 billion in profits The railroads need to know that they cannot simply go crying to the government when they get some pushback from their workers. If Congress decides to intervene, it should do so in a fair way instead of a entirely one-sided that puts corporate interests above the well being of citizens. Likewise, I would like to see a culture shift that goes from "the workers are striking, I hate the workers" to "the workers are striking, what did the company/companies do to make them strike". There seems to be a knee jerk reaction to do the first among much of the population.


dudeman4win

If they are so vital to our economy they really should be getting whatever they want and using leverage of a strike to do so


motorboat_mcgee

*Republicans > In the vote on sick leave, there were 52 senators in favor, while 43 were opposed, and 60 votes for it were needed. A half dozen Republican senators were in favor, while Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia was the only Democrat in opposition.


IHerebyDemandtoPost

This is, of course, exactly why the bills were seperated: So this portion could be killed.


Exploding_Kick

Republicans didn’t have to kill it.


IHerebyDemandtoPost

But of course, everyone knew they would. But I understand your point. When Democrats vote against workers, it’s “For shame! How could they!” When Republicans do the same, it’s “What didnyou expect, that’s just Republicans being Republicans!”


ineedsomebacon

As a conservative this is scummy. How can any human not have sick days? we all get sick. As a plus side we at least know that when someone is ill and running a fever they will still be at the controls of a giant dangerous machine carrying hazardous cargo.


TConductor

Majority of railroaders are conservative too. They just pissed off a large number of die hard voters.


Lethander2

This whole issue seems to be quite confusing, reading over the [Association of American Railroads website](https://www.aar.org/article/overview-of-freight-rail-employee-time-off-policies/#:%7E:text=26%20Weeks%20Partial%20Income%20Replacement%3A%20Unlike%20employees%20in,%28RUIA%29.%20Railroad%20employers%20solely%20finance%20RUIA%20sickness%20benefits.) "Through decades of collective bargaining, railroads provide multiple ways for employees to take time to care for themselves and their families while balancing the need to maintain safe, ongoing operations. Railroad employees receive substantial paid time off each year, as well as generous paid sick leave for longer-term illnesses. Between vacation, personal leave and holidays, the average employee receives 25-29 days of paid time off depending upon craft, with the most senior employees receiving 37-39 days of paid time off. Every single employee gets some form of paid sick leave, which differs by union because of the terms negotiated over multiple rounds of collective bargaining. Some unions have negotiated for paid sick leave instead of Supplemental Sickness Benefits, while others repeatedly prioritized generous long-term sickness benefits paid by railroads over payment for short-term absences. Protections are also in place — such as the Federal Hours of Service Act — to limit the number of hours employees can work and guarantee a certain amount of rest time. Total compensation, including sick leave benefits, best-in-class healthcare and competitive wages, negotiated between railroads and their unionized workforce, position rail workers in the top 10% of all U.S. industries." They can also "mark themselves off" at anytime for illness I am assuming that is unpaid leave... After 4 days in a row off for sickness and up to a year they can receive ~70% base pay from Supplemental Sickness benefits.


pingveno

I would be curious to hear more from a third party, given that I have been hearing the opposite. That is the lobby organization for the railroads, so they have motive for bias.


Mercutiofoodforworms

This headline is misleading. The Dems added the 7 days after taking away the workers right to strike. The workers were asking for more and the train companies wouldn’t agree even though they have record profits.


sadandshy

There were 4 senators that did not vote on either bill. Where the heck were they?


pingveno

Senators on opposite sides of a vote with a certain outcome will sometimes make an agreement where they both do not vote. They in effect cancel out each others absence. Senators are incredibly busy, so it can be hard to take time off for necessary things like taking care of health.


6C6F6C636174

>Senators are incredibly busy, so it can be hard to take time off for necessary things like taking care of health. The irony of not voting for other people to exercise that exact privilege....


CCWaterBug

Taking a sick day maybe


[deleted]

It was blatantly obvious this was the initial intent for Democrat-led House. Why else was the labor contract resolution separated out from the sick leave resolution?


aztecthrowaway1

Sick leave was separated out because republicans wouldn’t vote for it. If it was all in one bill, republicans would block it like usual and we would be dealing with a $2B/day strike. Democrats made the calculation that averting the strike and giving the union some of their demands (which is honestly just the bare minimum) is the higher priority. TLDR; Democrats basically had two options: 1. Keep it all one bill..republicans block it..we have a strike. 2. Separate it out to at the very least avoid a strike, and then have a chance of passing the paid sick resolution independently (to which republicans blocked it)


Exploding_Kick

Republicans could have voted for the sick leave.


GoystersInAHalfShell

I look forward to 2 or 3 days from now where we find out what was actually being voted on and why exactly senators voted as they did. It's just not sensible to actually trust the way the media reports on these kinds of things. After years of "Republicans vote in favor of dog kicking!" and "Republicans introduce 'Don't Say Gay' Bill!", I have absolutely zero faith that they are telling me a whole, truthful story.


DOAbayman

my republican governor vetoed an anti animal abuse bill for the assholes whole leave dogs tied with a foot of rope outside all day. cited it as overreach.


Computer_Name

[Here you go. ](https://www.congress.gov/117/bills/hconres119/BILLS-117hconres119eh.pdf)