<HTML><BODY><DIV style='font-family: "Verdana"; font-size: 10pt;'><DIV>On Dec. 18 Doug wrote:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>But I've got to say the Transport Workers Union has done nothing at <BR>all to build public support for what would almost certainly be a <BR>massively unpopular strike. I was in NYC for the 1980 strike, and it <BR>was absolute hell. And to a public used to cutbacks and DIY pension <BR>schemes, the TA's proposal to raise the retirement age from 55 to 62 <BR>doesn't sound unreasonable. (Of course, I don't agree, but I'm not <BR>the general public.) The union, and not management, would be blamed <BR>for forcing people to spend 2 hours walking to work and for the <BR>massive traffic jams. The union is widely seen as having lost the <BR>1980 strike, and the political situation of labor is certainly no <BR>better today.<BR><BR>The TWU could have done something with the Transit Authority's plan <BR>to eliminate conductors and token-booth clerks, playing on public <BR>fears of crime & terrorism. (The TA is buying new automated trains <BR>that can be completely controlled by the driver, eliminating the need <BR>for a conductor to open & close doors. And with tokens gone, replaced <BR>by a computerized MetroCard system, there's much less need for clerks <BR>to be in every station; token clerks have been replaced by customer <BR>service people, but they're much fewer in number, and more & more <BR>stations will be unstaffed in the future.) But they haven't done any <BR>agitprop. No leafleting, no ads. Their website <BR><http://twulocal100.org> features mainly reprints of newspaper <BR>articles. And given New York State's Taylor Law, which imposes <BR>enormous fines on public workers (two days of pay for every day of <BR>the strike) and unions for striking ($1.5 million in 1980), labor <BR>could get seriously screwed by a strike.<BR><BR>Doug<BR><BR>------------------</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Any second thoughts, cosidering that, in spite of the TWU's failure to build public support: 1) They did succeed in beating back the MTA's attempt to raise the retirement age to 62 and introduce a two-tier benefit structure, 2) public opinion in the city, though by no means universally sympathetic, was far from universally hostile to the strikers, either, and that the hysterical anti-union campaign by Bloomberg/Pataki/The Post and Daily News didn't quite catch on, and in fact overreached? Was something maybe gained by the strike?</DIV> <DIV><BR> </DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>