Fare strikes are a great way of striking without doing collateral damage to passersby. Unions are a good thing.
In the Netherlands during train strikes it is illegal to do this, it has been effective at reducing solidarity and further bolstering neoliberal values.
Fare strikes are actually a common thing. First recorded one was actually in the US though I believe they got their demands before actually carrying it out.
TLDR Unions work and I observe it every day from management’s POV.
My employer uses lots of IBEW union labor. I’m adjacent to HR functions.
EEs (employees) need things. My and adjacent departments handle their requests tied to annual insurance enrollment, wage discrepancies, leaves of absence (LOAs), employment verifications, etc. The first question my team asks of an EE task is “Are they union?”
Union = TOP priority
I have standing instructions from management to “do whatever it takes to keeps the unions off our backs”. I stop other duties to procure a resolution within 3 hours. Whatever deliverables (answers to questions, arranging back pay, LOA paperwork) are put in the hands of union EEs practically the same day.Non-union = diet priority
My team works in good faith, with EEs’ interests genuinely at the forefront of our minds, to make everyone happy, with an imperfect but high success rate (thus the “diet”). Nevertheless, hearing/reading “non-union” immediately puts the request at the end of the queue. It’ll get done, but probably in 10 days or so. The legal time frame is often much longer, and we use that knowledge liberally. Non-union tasks are the first things I jettison if other priorities bottleneck.Among my HR/adjacent coworkers are our share of smarmy middle class white women who scoff when a top priority union task hits their desk. They say shit like “Unions had their day and age, but…” and then shake their heads and literally not even complete that sentence, basking in solidarity with the same MAGA lady who asked everyone, video in hand, “(Elon’s) salute doesn’t look like that, does it?”
Our guy who represents the company in union negotiations is a MAGA propagandist who, in an informal interview with me about ideas to improve morale, answered my question “How could so many people see fit to elect a bona fide rapist as POTUS?” with a dubious anecdote about his elderly mother needing protection from all the trans talk at the dinner table.
I know this is a tangentious tangent. Apologies.
I had a union job once, in an auto parts factory.
The union was pretty corrupt by the time I got there. We had one contract bargain period and one union election while I was there. Before I got there, the union had accepted a pay cut (because they did one in the office, too! But that one got walked back pretty much right after while the union was stuck with theirs until the next contract).
So at the next contract, we expected pay to improve. Not because management was nice but because we had them by the balls because the plant’s main contract involved something like a $10k per minute fine if a late delivery caused their line to shut down. They once hired a helicopter to carry a bin to avoid this in a close call. That one line also paid for the whole plant, all the other parts we produced were just pure profit.
The first contract they came back with was the first time that union had rejected a contract in the first vote. Because it was complete shit. Our union reps were arguing that some people couldn’t afford a strike while pushing for us to accept it. It was rejected then they came back with a slightly better one which was accepted.
Then the election came. Another guy I knew wanted to run and try to actually fix a bunch of the issues we had. He received an anonymous threat that his tires would be slashed and ended up dropping out.
So most of the fucks already in there got reelected. Then, pretty much immediately after, the corrupt piece of shit of a union president got hired for an engineering job (despite no engineering background or degree) and the other union execs moved up through the inheritance rules.
Anyways, all that to say that even with the corruption, it was still the best paying unskilled job I’ve ever had and I had to be picky about what career path I took out of there for it to not be a downgrade or sidegrade.
People are so brain broken in this country (largely due to Reagan) that they see the obvious and direct benefits of unionization, and their reaction is “they don’t deserve it” rather than, “hey, why don’t we do that too?”
Our lax regulation on union busting is the reason unions have faded. When the butchers at a single Walmart location successfully unionized, Walmart immediately fired every butcher corporation-wide and changed to pre-packaged meats in a blatantly-illegal reaction designed to scare anyone else to from trying to unionize, and the government did nothing.
Mostly cuz those fuckin sparkies keep shoving the live wire in their mouth.
Source: machinist and mortal enemy of electricians. And welders. AND pipe fitters. And especially other machinists. Fucking machinists think they’re so much better than me. WHERE’S YOUR A AXIS NOW BUD?!
Bus drivers around me did that a couple years ago. (🇨🇦)
Pretty effective when the transit company still has to pay for fuel and deal with public backlash if they try to intervene.
Same! Probably the same area. Bus drivers are doing job action on the Island right now and as things get worse, I hope their union also directs them to do this.
Damn. Bus drivers in Japan are awesome. Canada, too, according to a sibling poster. Much respect.
I have long been a fan of striking with labor directly benefiting your community, on a material level. But it’s definitely rare. Presumably this gives bad incentives to, say politicians? Other folks who could pressure the bus company?
Don’t most people who take public transport have subscriptions?
A good chunk, yes, but it’s still impactful. More importantly, it’s the one thing the bus driver can reasonably do!
They could not show up, make people super pissed. I consider that a valid way to strike as welll
If they don’t turn up, then the company could get someone else in to drive the bus. But if they are driving the bus, someone else can’t.
what?
I think they mean monthly passes and such.
Yeah, this would sadly not work in Denmark. They removed paying in cash a few years back, not sure if you can still pay with card. :(
You know, $43.99/ month, premium routes extra, routes and schedules subject to change without notice?
The bus stops every 12 minutes to show you 30-120s of ads?
You know, the subscription service for buses!
What what?
I wish more public transit options had at least day passes that are truly unlimited
Around me, after paying for two trips you automatically get a day pass that is truly unlimited. $6/day is the maximum you will pay, even if you don’t explicitly purchase a day pass.
A monthly pass is $70. (That you do have to explicitly purchase)
I wouldn’t say most but many do. Depending how long the strike goes for, usually bus passes are monthly, so it would still be effective.
Also depends on when the strike starts. If the drivers wait until the last week of the month, people just won’t buy the next months pass until the strike is over, and by then they’ll probably just get individual tickets for the remainder of the new month, spending less overall.
Typical Japanese, so polite
That’s cool but bus drivers have WAY MORE leverage than that. Full strike would have much greater effect, and leaving buses to block the traffic would be full stop for most traffic
A full strike directly impacts the public diminishing their support. It’s easier for citizens to support a fair-strike because it doesn’t impact their wallets. Not that they should - but some of the public will blame the drivers if transit just stops and they now can’t get to work.
Simply refusing to take fares while maintaining services directly impacts the transit company by maintaining operating costs and cutting off their income, while allowing the public to continue going about their day.
Leaving the busses in traffic just pisses everyone off and potentially bridges into personal liability for the drivers.
Plus they’ll just tow them out of the way.
not if you’re blocking the suites exits and entries.
imagine the embarrassment it would form if the neighborhood knew the chief of the bus company fucked the city, and couldn’t travel.
They do, but malicious compliance while not impacting regular users is a smart alternative to the nuclear option. Why use all your powder on the first shot if this method might work.
I like the Idea, but as far as I know that particular strike wasn’t them fighting for thier working conditions, just the company operating the busses wanted to protest a competitor entering thier “territory”. So they did free rides to undercut the new bus company
Yeah, if it was the drivers themselves they wouldn’t be allowed in the depot. It’s not hard to lock a door
Based
