p 134 Florida East Coast goes non-union
Sep. 27th, 2009 08:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitout"In 1963, the Florida East Coast railway took a strike, hired scab workers, and began operation as a nonunion railroad. It suffered acts of sabotage against it, including sniper attacks and explosive charges set under the tracks...Before the strike, FEC was a marginal operation, in receivership from 1931 to 1960, its passenger trains losing money, its ferry traffic to Havana lost with the rise of Castro, most of its fresh citrus traffic gone [RLA: lost to trucks, who delivered it in a timely fashion, unlike railroads]...as a nonunion operation, it survived and prospered."
Wow.
(a) Railroads are _really_ subject to terrorist attacks, because they are accessible to so many people across a much larger space, compared to airlines.
(b) I'm reflexively pro-union, but at this point, it's a reflex. And, like my adult affection for libertarianism, one I work hard to curb firmly. The work-rules were ridiculous. I get wanting to hang onto the status quo. I really do. But come on, people. Some of this stuff should have changed before the greybeards hanging onto it were _born_.
Wow.
(a) Railroads are _really_ subject to terrorist attacks, because they are accessible to so many people across a much larger space, compared to airlines.
(b) I'm reflexively pro-union, but at this point, it's a reflex. And, like my adult affection for libertarianism, one I work hard to curb firmly. The work-rules were ridiculous. I get wanting to hang onto the status quo. I really do. But come on, people. Some of this stuff should have changed before the greybeards hanging onto it were _born_.