[lbo-talk] (no subject)

[turbulo at aol.com]

My initial impression of the NY Transit strike settlement is of a qualified victory for the union. True, the workers will now have to pay 1.5 percent of their health-care costs where they paid none before. But they seem to have defeated the MTA's more obnoxious demands: raising the retirement age, and Kalikow's last-minute substitute proposal that new hires pay four percent more than current employees into their pension funds. In fact, the whole two-tier idea seems to have bit the dust for now. The agreement to move the contract expiration date from December to January may even be a plus for the union, still allowing them to strike in winter without pissing off holiday shoppers. The winning 1966 strike took place in January.

 
The most important thing in distinguishing victory from defeat is how the workers view the outcome. If they think they gained nothing, the entire strike weapon will be discredited for years to come. But if they feel they gained, the idea of striking could become more popular and start to catch on once again. I can certainly understand the viewpoint of someone who says more might have been gained by holding out longer, but it would be hard to say that nothing was gained by the strike that actually took place (even though today's New York Post, which specializes in bourgeois propaganda aimed specifically at workers, is at great pains to have them draw this lesson). I think this contract will consolidate Toussaint' position, not only within the TWU, but within NYC labor as a whole. The contract he won is better by several orders of magnitude than AFSCME, sanitation workers or teachers.

 
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