Transport Workers Union local chief John Samuelson replied today to my piece in last week’s Post:

When the MTA lays off transit workers, there isn’t less work — just fewer workers doing more to keep the system going.That means more overtime, not less. More overtime means more wages paid out by the MTA.

The increase in wages paid out in 2010 stems from a faulty management decision, not from the workers who keep the system running everyday.

As for Gelinas’ call for a three-year wage freeze for transit workers in our next contract: Local 100 is not agreeing to zeroes — particularly when the tax on New York’s wealthiest people was eliminated.

Samuelson’s right about overtime. Layoffs of necessary workers don’t solve anything — fewer cleaners, for example, just means more trash, more delays, inevitable press complaints, and, yes, as Samuelson notes, more overtime.

The solution to high worker costs is not to get rid of the workers but to fix retirement benefits, health benefits, and work rules. Samuelson is surely in favor of all of that!

As for “not agreeing to zeroes” — well, it’s going to be an interesting winter. (The TWU contract expires in January.)

If Samuelson can’t take zeroes because it would put him out of a leadership position, he may prefer arbitration — then, any hypothetical zeroes wouldn’t be his fault.

But what would the arbitrators do?

They may opt to use the state’s new pattern example, in which case, the TWU would get zeroes, as much of the rest of the state workforce is — and transit workers might end up paying more for healthcare, too.

But arbitrators last time around opted to use the city’s workforce as an example for the TWU, resulting in 11.3 percent raises over three years. That’s why Bloomberg, too, should get some zero labor deals done, and fast (which the Post recommends in an edit today).

You may also like

How Will A Major Milk Plant Fit Under NY’s Climate Limits? It Won’t.

Plans to build a milk-processing facility in Monroe County were announced last year to great fanfare but with few details on how such an energy-intensive operation could fit within Albany’s strict climate rules poised to hit homes and businesses. The answer: it won’t have to. Read More

New York’s Proposed ‘MCO Tax’ Would Generate a Fraction of What Lawmakers Expected

The Hochul administration's proposed "MCO tax" would generate far less than the $4 billion in extra federal aid anticipated by state lawmakers when they approved the concept this spring, according to documents obtained by t Read More

Cuomo’s House Testimony Added New Misinformation about Covid in Nursing Homes

Throughout the scandal over former Governor Andrew Cuomo's handling of Covid-19 in nursing homes, Cuomo and his administration repeatedly spread bad information – misstating how its policies had worked, understating death Read More

Hochul Hides the Specifics of a Looming Tax on Health Insurance

The Hochul administration has requested federal approval for a multibillion-dollar "MCO tax" on health plans without announcing the move or providing details to the public. As by l Read More

Hochul’s CDPAP Overhaul Hands a Costly Win to 1199

Governor Hochul's overhaul of the Consumer Directed Personal Assistance Program reached a milestone Monday when she named a Georgia-based company as the winning bidder to be the program's statewide "fiscal intermediary" – Read More

New Yorkers’ Health Costs Spiral as Officials Take Credit for ‘Savings’

The latest round of health insurance premium hikes announced by New York regulators adds to evidence that state policies are drowning consumers instead of helping them. Late last mo Read More

The Math Does Not Support New York’s Climate Plan

I am not anti-renewable and I am not a climate denier. What I am is an engineer that lives by numbers. The numbers underpinning the CLCPA—namely the belief that New York can replace most of its natural gas-fired electricity generation with renewables in the next six or even nine years—are a fantasy. Read More

What Paul Francis Got Wrong About the Empire Center’s Nursing Home Research

In February 2021, the Empire Center published the first independent analysis of the Cuomo's administration much-debated directive ordering Covid-positive patients into nursing homes. The report found that the directive was associated with a statistically significant increase in resident deaths in the homes that admitted the  infected patients. Read More