By George Tsai
As it did to thousands of others, the strike threw my family life into confusion. I had to get up very early each day to drive two members of the family to find carpools heading for different locations and to pick them up in the evening in unfamiliar places.Despite their hostile rhetoric during the strike, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Transport Workers Union perhaps have buried the hatchet after they reached an agreement on a three-year contract on Dec. 27. Good for them. I hope this type of nuisance will never happen again! The TWU shortened its strike for the obvious reason that it got little public support for its cause this time around, even though its members were picketing in the cold. The heavy fines the judge imposed on the union and its members might also be a factor that prompted the TWU leadership to call it quits. Without question their unjustifiable demand and bad choice of the holiday-shopping season as the time to strike sparked public outcries. Americans now live much longer than a generation ago, yet the union opposed raising the retirement age from 55 to 62 for its future members, while workers in other professions have to reach 65 or 67 to qualify for pensions and other benefitsThe state Taylor Law bars public servants from going on strike. So Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the strike “illegal and selfish.'' He also pointed out that the compensation ($47,000 to $55,000) for many of the TWU workers is significantly higher than that of the average workers in the city. Public workers should take note that they cannot put themselves above the law. Democracy represents the rule of law. If you want to enjoy that privilege, then you must obey the law.Any arbitrary action they take would affect millions of people. Therefore, it's unfair for the TWU leadership to put the benefits of its 33,700 members above those of the 7 million commuters. Queens' commuters were perhaps hardest hit during the three-day strike.The strike forced a lot of commuters to stay home because they could not find other ways of getting to work in the city or in other boroughs. Many Asian commuters in the greater Flushing area seemingly had an edge over those in other communities by taking the mini-buses to Lower Manhattan, but the shrewd bus owners, taking advantage of the situation, charged each rider an additional $3 for one-way trip. In the private sector, nevertheless, unions have the legal power to fight the management for its members. That often spawns a rivalry between the two sides. A union strike can only happen in a free and democratic society. So we have the right to love it or hate it. This time, it seems, more people chose the latter. As I see it, that power is shrinking, and unions may become an endangered species in the foreseeable future. It's a trend in the 21st Century, isn't it?In any walkout, there are more losers than winners. Some nongovernmental unions ended up being the losers in battles against the management, which always can find a reason or two to keep contentious workers out of the building forever. I know that firsthand because I was a Newspaper Guild member years ago.After the agreement, the TWU vowed to fine those who crossed the picket lines. This reminds me of what I went through. I paid a dear price in a long-drawn-out strike in which I was beaten for attempting to get into the office building in the wee hours of one morning.I had lived in fear for quite a while because I thought some one was trying to get me. The two front tires on my car were slashed while it was parked in a lot near the office building. So after much soul-searching, I decided to quit that union for the sake of my career and family. To do otherwise would betray my conscience.The reason leading to that strike was neither for money nor for pension nor for security. The guild president called on all members to back a sister union of linotype operators. The management decided to replace those aging machines with computers. Fearing the imminent loss of jobs, those operators voiced their opposition to the move and went on strike, disregarding a promise that nobody would be laid off. They would exit the company only through attrition, according to the official notice I read. I thought it was a fair deal. Any objection to that change was against progress.The guild president took me to the woodshed for my defiance. But that failed to shake my determination. In those days, the union had a big say in the hiring of new employees. I happened to fall into the last-hired-first fired category. All but three, including me, in the editorial department, proudly joined the strike, which had lasted about three years. It was the longest in North American newspaper history. Sadly, all those who walked off their jobs were unable to return.By the third year, only a couple of zealots who probably could not find a job elsewhere were still pacing back and forth in front of the building. Were they heroes or villains? Maybe both.
