[US labor law is designed to prevent railroad strikes like the
kind that shook America in the past. But the constant cuts to staffing
levels and erosion of conditions for rail workers could produce a
national rail walkoff by September. ]
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115,000 RAILROAD WORKERS ARE WEIGHING A NATIONAL STRIKE  
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Jeff Schuhrke
August 5, 2022
Jacobin
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_ US labor law is designed to prevent railroad strikes like the kind
that shook America in the past. But the constant cuts to staffing
levels and erosion of conditions for rail workers could produce a
national rail walkoff by September. _

A rail worker walks alongside a segment of newly laid track on a BNSF
Railway line., Luke Sharrett / Bloomberg via Getty Images

 

After thirty months of stalled contract negotiations amid the pandemic
— all while enduring stagnant wages, heavier workloads, unsafe
conditions, and draconian attendance policies — 115,000 fed-up US
freight railroad workers are mobilizing for a possible national
strike
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On Saturday, a few hundred rail workers from multiple craft unions
gathered with allies in Galesburg, Illinois, to signal to the federal
government and major rail carriers that they are ready for a showdown.

“I have never seen in my experience working in this industry the
kind of unity that you all are displaying right now,” Greg Regan,
president of the AFL-CIO’s Transportation Trades Department, told
the crowd. “This is not just a rail labor fight; this is a labor
movement fight.”

Some of the craft unions represented at the Galesburg event included
the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers –
Transportation Division (SMART-TD), the Teamsters’ Brotherhood of
Maintenance of Way Employes Division (BMWED), and the International
Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron Ship Builders, Blacksmiths, Forgers
and Helpers (Boilermakers).

Due to the cumbersome bargaining process
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the 1926 Railway Labor Act (RLA) — which allowed Joe Biden to
intervene last month by appointing
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presidential emergency board to make recommendations to try resolving
the dispute — the earliest a work stoppage could occur is September.

Although US labor history is replete with militant railroad strikes
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have brought the economy to a halt, such actions have become rare in
modern times thanks to the legal constraints of the RLA and ongoing
division of rail workers into a dozen separate craft unions.

But many of the workers believe
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strike could happen this time around. Last month, members of the
Teamsters-affiliated Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen
voted to authorize a strike
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over 99.5 percent approval. SMART-TD’s general chairpersons have
also taken the first step
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authorizing a work stoppage.

All twelve rail unions are currently negotiating in lockstep at the
bargaining table
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try to maximize their leverage, seeking raises that keep up with
inflation, lower health care costs, and expanded paid leave.

“More With Less”

For several years, major, “Class I” rail carriers like BNSF, Union
Pacific, Norfolk Southern, and CSX have implemented ​precision
scheduled railroading
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— a kind of lean production
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just-in-time model designed to maximize shareholder profits by
slashing expenses.

“PSR is a marketing thing, not a logistical thing,” said Johnny
Walker, a seventeen-year train conductor and SMART-TD member who
traveled from Baltimore to attend the Galesburg rally. “There’s no
standardization. The PSR metrics are different for BNSF or CSX or
Union Pacific, so there’s nothing to go on. It’s like the wolf
guarding the henhouse.”

Because of PSR cost cutting, in the past six years, the Class I
railroads have collectively lost 29
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their workforce
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about forty-five thousand employees, leaving the industry severely
understaffed and unable to move freight efficiently.

“I blame the carriers for supply chain disruption and possibly even
inflation. Things aren’t getting to market because the railroads
aren’t shipping the goods,” said Matt Weaver, an Ohio-based
organizer for the BMWED, also a longtime rail worker who attended
Saturday’s rally.

While PSR has harmed workers, shippers, and consumers, it has given
the rail carriers record
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with shareholders raking in $183 billion
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buybacks and dividends over the last decade.

“My prediction is our rail industry is going to end up like Enron,
where they made a whole bunch of money but it wasn’t real,” Walker
said.

Several hundred rail workers from various unions demonstrated last
Saturday in Galesburg, Illinois, where Warren Buffett’s BNSF Railway
is the biggest employer. (Courtesy of author)

Although railroading has always involved grueling hours and irregular
schedules, the industry has traditionally been able to recruit and
retain workers by offering relatively good pay and strong retirement
benefits. That is no longer the case.

“The word’s out that the railroad’s not the big dog on the block
anymore when it comes to employers,” explained Nick Allen, a
Galesburg BMWED member who helped organize the rally. “They cut it
back so far that now they’re in a hiring frenzy to try to fill jobs
that they just can’t fill anymore.”

Remaining workers are forced to clock even longer and less predictable
hours through strict attendance policies
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“They’re doing more with less. They have to take steps to get us
to work more because of their own inefficiencies in hiring the right
amount of people,” said Jordan Booth, a SMART-TD member in Galesburg
who also helped organize the rally.

 

Mark McDannald Jr, a Boilermakers member who works at the Galesburg
diesel shop, said he has seen nearly sixty of his coworkers leave in
the past year due to inadequate paid sick leave and deteriorating
working conditions.

“They’re going to different jobs because they’re making better
money. The retirement isn’t even keeping them working here. It’s
not even worth it,” he said.

“The attrition is terrible,” Weaver said. “When I applied [in
1994], there were six hundred people in the room. Now there’s like
three or four.”

Workers say the railroads are using the staffing shortage to try to
justify their long-sought
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freight train crews from at least two workers to only one.

“With the way they’re complaining about how they can’t get
enough manpower, more than likely there’s only going to be one
person to tie down the train and go walk the train,” Walker said.

Walker noted the danger of having one-person crews, pointing to
the 2013 Quebec rail disaster
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lone engineer on a freight train carrying 2 million gallons of crude
oil failed to securely tie down the train, leading to a derailment and
explosion that killed forty-seven people and destroyed over thirty
buildings in the town of Lac-Mégantic.

“It’s not what’s gonna happen, it’s when it’s gonna
happen,” he warned.

Citing such safety concerns, last week, the Department of
Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration proposed a new
rule
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minimum two-person crews, except in “certain low risk operations.”
A public comment period
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proposed rule is open from now until September 26, after which a final
decision will be made.

A Railroad Town

A small city in western Illinois, Galesburg has been a key Midwestern
railroad hub since the days when antislavery figures like Frederick
Douglass, Horace Greeley, and future president Abraham Lincoln rolled
into town to give speeches to the local abolitionist citizenry.

Facing exploitation from their distant wealthy employers, as far back
as the 1860s, rail workers in Galesburg helped found
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unions in the country, like the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers
and Trainmen. Galesburg’s son, poet, journalist, historian, and folk
singer Carl Sandburg was himself the child of an immigrant railroad
worker. (A statue of the pro-labor Sandburg stood watch over
Saturday’s rally in the city’s central park.)

The railroads helped bring manufacturing jobs in the twentieth
century, including a massive Maytag appliance factory that, at its
height, employed five thousand in good-paying, union jobs. But in a
story that played out across the Rust Belt, Maytag shuttered the
plant
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2004, and moved production to Mexico.

“That was a big hit to this economy here in Galesburg,” said the
BMWED’s Allen. “So the railroad now is even more important. If we
lose enough railroad jobs, it would be another huge hit.”

Indeed, the city’s largest employer
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Railway, owned by billionaire Warren Buffett.

“This is a railroad town. Every single person in Galesburg should be
here today,” Peter Schwartzman, the city’s recently elected Green
Party mayor, said at the rally. “If this railroad system doesn’t
work, that’s one big domino that’s going to affect everybody
else’s lives in this area.”

Another supporter who came from out of town was Dylan Parker, Fifth
Ward alderperson for nearby Rock Island, Illinois.

“It’s the same story everywhere: corporate America trying to screw
over workers to up their profits,” said Parker, who is also cochair
of the Quad Cities DSA labor committee. “It’s the same story
it’s always been, whether now or 150 years ago, when these unions
first organized.”

_JEFF SCHUHRKE is a labor historian who teaches at the University of
Illinois at Chicago. He is a member of UIC United Faculty, AFT Local
6456, and a former member of the UIC Graduate Employees Organization,
AFT Local 6297._

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* Labor
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* unions
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* Strikes
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* railroads
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* U.S. economy
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