WEBVTT - The Rail Strike is Dead, Long Live the Rail Strike 0:00:07.920 --> 0:00:14.640 It could happen here. Rail Strike Edition. I'm Robert Evans, Garrison, Davis, Chris. 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:18.239 How are we all? How are we all doing? How's this? 0:00:18.880 --> 0:00:21.720 We were talking about a rail strike today. We're praying, 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:25.680 we're praying for it. It hasn't happened. If you're listening 0:00:25.680 --> 0:00:28.040 to this, you probably know the broad strokes of this, 0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:30.320 which is that the people who make the trains go, 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:33.120 and by the way, trains are like a critical part 0:00:33.120 --> 0:00:35.239 of us all not starving to death or running out 0:00:35.240 --> 0:00:37.640 of insulin or whatever. The people who make those trains 0:00:37.640 --> 0:00:39.760 go have a pretty hard job and there's not a 0:00:39.760 --> 0:00:42.519 lot of them. And for a variety of reasons that 0:00:42.640 --> 0:00:46.040 boiled down to companies not wanting to spend money. Uh, 0:00:46.080 --> 0:00:49.080 it's impossible for that. They don't get sick days. Um. 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:51.519 So there were a bunch of other ship things like 0:00:51.600 --> 0:00:54.400 things that were ship about the job, including pay, especially 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:57.760 since rail company profits have been at like record levels, 0:00:58.160 --> 0:01:01.480 so they were threatening to strike. There were union negotiations. 0:01:01.840 --> 0:01:04.680 Some of the union leaders reached an agreement with the 0:01:04.800 --> 0:01:09.280 rail companies, but it wasn't it didn't include the sick days. 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:14.240 So a lot of workers, potentially most of them are 0:01:14.640 --> 0:01:17.720 We're at least willing to strike. And then Biden came 0:01:17.760 --> 0:01:21.560 in and had Congress basically say do the same thing 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:24.080 Reagan did to the air traffic controllers in the eighties, 0:01:24.120 --> 0:01:27.440 where it's like, no, if you strike, it's illegal because 0:01:27.760 --> 0:01:31.839 this is a too critical a service for the country. Anyway, 0:01:31.959 --> 0:01:34.679 that's broadly the situation. Chris, you know this a lot 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:38.640 better than I the most pro labor president, the most 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:42.240 pro labor presor okay, this is I think this is 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:46.600 actually like that's that's why I don't like, that's my knowledge, 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:48.680 and I think that's close to a layman's knowledge. So 0:01:48.720 --> 0:01:51.400 I'm waiting for you to fill in the gap. All right, 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:54.080 let's let's let's start with what Biden has actually done, 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:56.720 because it's it's it's slightly different than what Reagan was 0:01:56.760 --> 0:01:59.600 doing there with the air traffic controllers. Um. Part of 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:02.040 the reason everything is fucked up with the railroads is that, 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:06.560 like railroads almost since their inception have had like an 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:11.119 almost entirely different regulatory framework than like anything else. So 0:02:11.320 --> 0:02:14.040 you know, your normal strike is covered by the National 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:16.600 Labor Relations Act. Right, you go through your National Labor 0:02:16.600 --> 0:02:19.560 Relations Board, you do your votes, blah blah, blah blah. Uh. 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:22.160 If your railroad workers are not covered by that, they're 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:25.639 covered something by something called the Railway Labor Act, which 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:29.040 lets Congress just be like, no, fuck you, you have 0:02:29.160 --> 0:02:31.320 to take this contract. And the other thing it does, 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:33.240 I mean, there is like a it is a oh 0:02:33.280 --> 0:02:36.520 I didn't realize that so well before, so well before, 0:02:36.639 --> 0:02:39.480 like you know, the modern era, and Reagan did his 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:42.560 ship with the air traffic controllers. There was a it 0:02:42.600 --> 0:02:44.960 was written into the law that Congress could say like, yeah, 0:02:45.000 --> 0:02:47.560 you're a to a rail strike. That's really interesting, I guess, 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:49.480 and it goes back to the days when they were 0:02:50.120 --> 0:02:53.000 literally making them out of human bones. Yeah. I mean 0:02:53.280 --> 0:02:56.359 it's been so it's been amended over time and it's 0:02:56.440 --> 0:02:58.200 changed a bit. And there's some other stuff that happened 0:02:58.200 --> 0:03:00.000 in the nineties. After there's a there's a there was 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:01.880 a failed rail strike in the nineties where Congress is 0:03:01.880 --> 0:03:03.480 also just like, no, fuck you, you have to take 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:07.120 this contract. But yeah, the the important thing about this 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:11.440 is that like, okay, so in order to even potentially strike, 0:03:11.600 --> 0:03:14.760 you have to go through so much bullshit. It's called 0:03:14.800 --> 0:03:17.240 self help in the law. Like the people have been 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:19.760 trying to strike for two years, and everything that we're 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:23.240 seeing now is the product of two years of bullshit 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:25.799 of these like there's all of this nonsense you have 0:03:25.840 --> 0:03:27.919 to go through. There's these like cooling off mandatory cooling 0:03:27.960 --> 0:03:31.280 off periods. You can't like, uh, you know, you have 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:32.840 to like wait before you do anything else, and you 0:03:32.840 --> 0:03:34.000 have to go to the next step, the next step, 0:03:34.000 --> 0:03:37.280 and the final step is Joe Biden had the choice 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:39.760 to either let these rail workers strike and actually get 0:03:39.800 --> 0:03:41.800 the things that they fucking needed, or he could tell 0:03:41.840 --> 0:03:44.440 them to funk off and just eat a contract. And 0:03:44.560 --> 0:03:46.520 that that that that's what's happened right now, is that 0:03:46.600 --> 0:03:50.280 Joe Biden has just and also again with the support 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:54.120 of both Houses of Congress. And I also like explicitly 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:55.920 want to mention here that a lot a lot of 0:03:55.960 --> 0:03:59.520 nominally socialist politicians, including like a lot of social Democrats 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:03.280 have yet vote. Talk about that too, because that that's 0:04:03.320 --> 0:04:05.880 that's another part of it. That again, so my my 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:09.400 surface and I guess I'm playing playing the podcast idiot 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:11.880 in this one, which is not abnormal for me. But 0:04:12.000 --> 0:04:16.159 my like layman's understanding of what happened with this is that, uh, 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:19.039 there was a bill up in Congress as to whether 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:22.880 or not to endorse this, and uh, a bunch of 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:25.400 progressives said that they wouldn't vote on it unless it 0:04:25.480 --> 0:04:29.880 included seven days of paid sick leave, including Sanders that 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:33.400 got pushed off into a separate bill, And there was 0:04:33.440 --> 0:04:36.480 like some kind of sketchy wording about like, well we 0:04:36.520 --> 0:04:40.000 won't you know, like I I don't. I don't understand 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:42.040 the congressional hijinks, but I know they just wound up 0:04:42.120 --> 0:04:47.120 voting for the the negotiate like what the union had 0:04:47.160 --> 0:04:51.240 negotiated without any sick leaf like it. Yeah, Like it 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:53.280 seems like it kind of provided an opportunity for a 0:04:53.279 --> 0:04:56.960 bunch of progressives in the House to vote yes on 0:04:57.000 --> 0:04:59.080 the sick leave knowing that it wouldn't pass the Senate 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:00.880 and knowing that the strip I would still get stopped. 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:03.360 Right Like what am I? Um? I mean? It's basically 0:05:03.440 --> 0:05:07.159 that like the I'm not a congress nowhere. Yeah, I 0:05:07.160 --> 0:05:09.120 mean there there's a bunch of sort of hiji inks 0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:11.240 that were happening in Congress where there's different there's a 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:12.839 sciety different version of the bill in the House, and 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:16.800 they had this whole thing. But okay, the House, the 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:19.640 House one for sick leaved did pass with support of 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:24.800 every Yeah, and it's three three Republicans. But Okay, the 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:27.160 thing I think I want to point out here and 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:28.600 I want to move away from the sick leave thing 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:30.120 because the sick that's the fact that these people don't 0:05:30.160 --> 0:05:32.880 have sick leave is important. This is also not like 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:36.040 the main thing the strike was about, like things are, 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:38.440 things are, things are so much worse like things are, 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:41.720 things are so much like infinitely worse than people like 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:44.680 at all understands. Like what the thing that the thing 0:05:44.680 --> 0:05:46.720 that's real strike is about, if you if you go 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:49.640 like actually talk to the people who are doing it, 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:53.000 is that these people are on call for nine of 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:55.600 their lives, like and and when I say then of 0:05:55.600 --> 0:05:58.000 their lives, they're on call while they were asleep. They're 0:05:58.040 --> 0:06:00.800 on call constantly. Uh, they're there's there's no way to 0:06:00.839 --> 0:06:02.560 even there's no way to plan a consistant sly schedule 0:06:02.600 --> 0:06:05.159 because you can just be on call. And you know, 0:06:05.200 --> 0:06:07.200 and part part part of what's going on here. And 0:06:07.200 --> 0:06:09.200 if if you read the sort of detailed accounts, you 0:06:09.400 --> 0:06:11.000 will see a lot of people talking about this thing 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:17.280 called precision scheduled railroading. Yeah, precision scheduled railroading was it 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:23.040 was a great theory kind of that was implemented so 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:27.760 atrociously badly. It's basically fucked like the entire economy. Um 0:06:27.839 --> 0:06:29.280 that the idea behind it was like you could you 0:06:29.279 --> 0:06:32.359 could schedule when like a freight railroad was going to 0:06:32.400 --> 0:06:34.600 go right, and this this would give you a bunch 0:06:34.600 --> 0:06:38.479 of efficiency bonuses. You could plan like you could schedule 0:06:38.560 --> 0:06:41.080 things around each other. Um, this just didn't happen. People 0:06:41.080 --> 0:06:45.320 implemented it, but what they implemented was just this nightmarror 0:06:45.400 --> 0:06:48.599 like amalgamation of we're going to reduce a bunch of 0:06:48.600 --> 0:06:51.360 staff and then we're going to make these trains that 0:06:51.440 --> 0:06:55.160 have like two hundred cars on them. And this has 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:57.480 been a catastrophe. It's called monster trains. That there's there's 0:06:57.720 --> 0:07:01.039 Justin Rosniak, who's a podcast. See it doesn't seem like 0:07:01.040 --> 0:07:03.840 a good solution to the problem of not enough guys 0:07:03.920 --> 0:07:08.360 to make trains work is make the trains huge. It's 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:13.040 justnorable train crash. It's awful. Again, these are your twarter 0:07:13.080 --> 0:07:14.600 trains long right, So if if you don't get the 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:16.280 wait you ship you should write, the train will fucking 0:07:16.280 --> 0:07:18.480 fall over. They keep doing this there's this has been 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:20.520 happening for like several years now. Is there's just trains 0:07:20.560 --> 0:07:23.520 everywhere derailing. There's like no coverage of it. You know, 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:25.720 you know, you know, you know where I knew that from. 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:28.480 Chris Garrison will tell you when I get when I 0:07:28.480 --> 0:07:30.680 get drunk or something late at night. My favorite thing 0:07:30.720 --> 0:07:33.560 to watch his videos of trains hitting stuff and train 0:07:33.640 --> 0:07:36.800 crashes are amazing to watch. It's incredible to think of 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:39.040 all the human ingenuity it took to make that big, 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:43.560 big boom. There's thousands of videos on YouTube of cargo 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:48.360 getting stuck on train tracks and train happening through there yea, 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:54.240 and boxes being pull verized in the air they rised. 0:07:54.440 --> 0:08:07.520 It's so cool. So the downside is that one day 0:08:07.560 --> 0:08:09.440 we're gonna have one of these trains that is run 0:08:09.480 --> 0:08:11.200 by a person who has had three hours of sleep 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:13.480 in the last forty eight hours, and it's gonna be 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.560 caring like fucking I don't know, it's gonna be carrying 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:19.080 like sodium nitrate on it or some ship and it's 0:08:19.080 --> 0:08:20.600 just going to explode and it is going to kill 0:08:20.760 --> 0:08:23.360 enormous every place. That just actually happened in Canada like 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.920 a decade ago. But yeah, like these trains are too big. 0:08:27.040 --> 0:08:29.400 They're so big they don't fit in the fucking rail yards. 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:32.360 Like they're so big that most the training infrastructure doesn't 0:08:32.400 --> 0:08:35.600 work for them. They are so everything is okay. They're 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.280 they're really really really badly planned, despite the fact that 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:41.960 this is supposed to be precision scheduled railroading. Like they're 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:45.240 unbelievably badly planned. You have people just like being forced 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:47.720 to just like sit there for twelve hours in a train, 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:50.200 like waiting for the rest of like the other like 0:08:50.320 --> 0:08:52.160 ninety five cars that are supposed to be on this 0:08:52.200 --> 0:08:54.679 train to show up. You know. The situation just like 0:08:54.720 --> 0:08:57.000 it is utterly nightmares and everything about this, Right, if 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:58.760 you're an engineer, right, and you're in one of these 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:01.440 trains and you're in there for twelve fucking hours in 0:09:01.440 --> 0:09:04.760 this train, you legally can't have your phone because you know, 0:09:04.760 --> 0:09:06.160 I mean, this is a safety thing, right, And in 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:07.800 some sense this makes sense. It's like a safety measure. 0:09:07.840 --> 0:09:10.080 You can't have your phone because you know, you can't 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:11.880 be distracted what you're talking about. You're just sucking sitting 0:09:11.880 --> 0:09:15.040 on the tracks for like twelve hours, and you know 0:09:15.160 --> 0:09:16.719 this this this stuff is, you know, and the fact 0:09:16.760 --> 0:09:18.400 that the fact that people are on call constantly, the 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:21.120 fact that the entire rail network is just physically falling apart. 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:23.360 Because the other thing about these trains, right, they make 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:25.200 a enormous amount of money, None of them ever fucking 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:27.520 show up on time. It's a disgaster. It's a catastrophe, 0:09:27.559 --> 0:09:29.760 like like like genuinely like part of the reason why 0:09:29.760 --> 0:09:32.440 we're having all these supply issues is that no train 0:09:32.600 --> 0:09:34.920 has fucking showed up on time in like four years. 0:09:35.720 --> 0:09:39.120 And it's there's a new contract. It's okay that the 0:09:39.120 --> 0:09:42.800 new contracts signed in says that workers can have up 0:09:42.840 --> 0:09:47.000 to three unpaid days off for medical appointments. Oh wow, 0:09:47.480 --> 0:09:53.400 that's something. It's a three unpaid tabs stays off for 0:09:53.559 --> 0:09:58.560 pre made medical appointments. Yeah, no, none of forever. Yeah. 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:00.920 And it gets like like these people are on call 0:10:01.280 --> 0:10:04.280 for of their lives. You can't even like like you 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:06.920 can't schedule when you're going to sleep because you might 0:10:06.960 --> 0:10:09.120 be on call and on call might be you have 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:12.880 to fucking like drive like several hours to a place 0:10:13.320 --> 0:10:14.840 so you can get on a train, and the train 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:17.280 cannot leave, and the train eventually leaves like six hours 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:18.880 later and you fucking drive and then you're just like 0:10:18.960 --> 0:10:21.760 dropped off somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and then unpaid, 0:10:21.840 --> 0:10:24.520 you have to go back to like where you live. 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:28.000 It is like, like, Okay, the thing, the thing I 0:10:28.000 --> 0:10:32.080 wanted to like get out of this is like the 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:35.840 railroading system in general, that the system of freight railroading 0:10:35.840 --> 0:10:37.840 that we have in the US is in the midst 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:41.000 of collapsing. Like it it is falling apart, It is 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:44.760 not working, it is is becoming increasingly dangerous. It is 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:48.240 I mean utterly inhumane for the people working on it. 0:10:48.559 --> 0:10:50.959 And and you know, none of the fucking even this 0:10:51.120 --> 0:10:54.320 even the sick Bowl contract, like didn't do anything for it. Right, 0:10:54.360 --> 0:10:56.760 The only way this actually could have been resolved is 0:10:56.800 --> 0:10:58.679 if Joe Biden and in a fifth Democrats and if 0:10:58.679 --> 0:11:01.040 Congress hadn't been fucking hours and had let these people 0:11:01.040 --> 0:11:04.640 strike because these kinds of concessions like and you know, 0:11:04.679 --> 0:11:06.680 I also like I don't want to let the fucking 0:11:06.760 --> 0:11:08.840 unions off the hook here too, because they know all 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:11.080 of this. But again, most of the sort of like 0:11:11.080 --> 0:11:13.079 senior union people are very tight with a very tight 0:11:13.120 --> 0:11:14.800 with Democratic Party. This is part of why all of 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:17.840 this ship was postponed until after the elections because they 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:19.640 didn't you know, they didn't want to deal with the ship. 0:11:19.720 --> 0:11:21.839 They've been trying to force people to sign these contract too, 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:24.280 and it's it's it's a ship show. It is a 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:29.000 just absolute catastrophe on on every every level. Yeah. I mean, 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:32.680 it's almost as if the rail system probably shouldn't be 0:11:32.760 --> 0:11:37.560 run by private interests. Yeah, because there's going to be 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:41.600 now a hundred hundred fifteen rail workers who are forced 0:11:41.600 --> 0:11:44.920 to work under these still not great conditions. Meanwhile, the 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:47.720 managers and the owners of the railroads get to go 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:51.000 back to just making tons of money. Yeah, and again 0:11:51.080 --> 0:11:53.719 record profits. None of this is happening, Not that that 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:55.439 would make it okay, but none of this is happening 0:11:55.440 --> 0:11:57.840 in an environment well, well, you know, we're running at 0:11:57.840 --> 0:11:59.719 a loss and we we have no money and no 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:02.679 ability to like like they have. They're making hundreds of 0:12:02.679 --> 0:12:05.000 billions of dollars profits like this is this is like 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:07.080 one of the most profitable times to run a railroad 0:12:07.080 --> 0:12:10.880 in US. You can incentivize more people to be railroad 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:14.040 road workers if the job isn't a fucking nightmare. For example, 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:16.920 what if instead of not being able to have their phones. 0:12:17.320 --> 0:12:19.640 We gave each of them a DVD player in a 0:12:19.720 --> 0:12:22.840 screen with a DVD of step Brothers, and they could 0:12:22.840 --> 0:12:25.240 watch step Brothers as much as they want while piloting 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:27.839 a train. I think that would actually get I think 0:12:27.840 --> 0:12:31.640 that would cause mass, mass layoff set at a rail yard. 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:36.960 That's that's how we get the strike. We include this 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:40.080 in the next provision for destruction. I was I was 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:44.440 stealthying in my accelerationist beliefs here. This is the fastest 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:49.280 way it can transit infrastruction. We've got like two years 0:12:49.320 --> 0:12:52.440 before this holding fucking implodes anyways, because part part of 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:55.800 what's keeping people in the railroading system is that so 0:12:56.040 --> 0:12:58.920 railroading also has its own pension system that's like disconnected 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:01.559 from the regular pension system him and you have to 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:03.120 you have to work there for ten years in order 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:05.520 to collect your pension. This is why like enormous numbers 0:13:05.559 --> 0:13:08.320 of people just haven't left right. People have been leaving right, 0:13:08.840 --> 0:13:10.920 But there's a there's a huge number of people who 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:13.920 were hiring these giant expansion in two thousand four, and 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:16.880 you know, like we're two years out from that contract 0:13:16.960 --> 0:13:18.600 from all these people being able to collect their pensions 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:22.160 and fucking leaving. Yeah, that's just like it's like, this 0:13:22.240 --> 0:13:25.400 is the only chance I have to ever not work 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:27.520 myself to death, so I have to tough it out. 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:30.560 But yeah, yeah, but these those those people are those 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:31.800 people are going to leave. And you know, this is 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:33.720 this is the sort of like this is the sort 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:36.040 of hammer that capitalism has built over its own head, 0:13:36.080 --> 0:13:39.640 which is that like, yeah, congratulations, you you successfully flexibilized 0:13:39.640 --> 0:13:43.120 and casualized your entire workforce. That means that if people 0:13:43.640 --> 0:13:46.360 like don't want to do your shitty job, they can 0:13:46.440 --> 0:13:49.600 leave and find another job. And at some point, like 0:13:49.880 --> 0:13:51.960 there are there is a ship that in this economy 0:13:52.000 --> 0:13:54.760 that like actually does need to be done. But these 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:57.240 people have been sort of like so blinded by just 0:13:57.400 --> 0:14:00.600 like you know, they're so so blinded by lying goes up. 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:03.160 They're so blinded by short term profit that they really 0:14:03.280 --> 0:14:06.080 don't understand that at some point there's just not gonna 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:08.440 be fucking workers to run the railroad. Yeah, I mean, 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:10.600 And a lot of this situation is built off of 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:14.000 and instead of being compared to Reagan's stuff for their 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:17.040 traffic controllers, it's actually more similar to what Carter did 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:20.360 with some with some airline workers. Um. Then also with 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:24.160 the with the the nineteen eight kind of a railroad 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:28.800 Deregulation act Um which which caused would would you, which 0:14:28.800 --> 0:14:32.520 gave a lot more power to companies to run the railroads. 0:14:33.040 --> 0:14:36.520 And that's that is what kind of shifted shifted things 0:14:36.560 --> 0:14:39.000 to our to our current, our current problem because they 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:42.360 were they gave permission for these rail companies to close 0:14:42.400 --> 0:14:44.960 down lines that were less profitable and to set their 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:49.520 own um freight rates. And yeah, it's it's not being 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:53.040 controlled by the inter State Commerce Commission. Instead it's being 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:56.600 controlled by execuity. That that thing's weird, right because like, 0:14:57.480 --> 0:15:00.000 on the one hand, like the wave of corporates, all 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:01.920 dation that happened after that is like a disaster, and 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:04.720 the fact that there's basically like four real like reil 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:06.760 companies now is a disaster. On the other hand, like 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:08.680 it is also true that the Interstate Commerce Board was 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:13.720 like dogshited his jaws. It also sucked. Yes, absolutely it sucked, 0:15:13.760 --> 0:15:16.040 and for a short period of time it actually did 0:15:16.440 --> 0:15:21.880 improve things. But now it's it's it's it's powers coalescing 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:25.400 again into the very types of monopolies that caused the 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:30.600 that caused railroad regulation to be necessary back in the 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:34.280 nineteenth century. Like in the first place, um power is 0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:38.760 being consolidated again, and it's it's this vicious, vicious cycle 0:15:39.440 --> 0:15:44.000 that are that fundamentally puts short term profits above of 0:15:44.720 --> 0:15:49.000 the conditions of workers. Yeah, I think, like, you know, okay, 0:15:49.080 --> 0:15:52.440 so there have been a lot of people talking about, 0:15:52.440 --> 0:15:54.320 like what the potential solutions to this are in a 0:15:54.400 --> 0:15:59.560 sort of macro sense, because like, okay, even even with 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:03.280 a better contract, right, like, something actually has to be 0:16:03.320 --> 0:16:06.280 done in order to force the railroads to not fucking 0:16:06.320 --> 0:16:10.440 suck and to like actually properly scheduled their goddamn trains 0:16:10.520 --> 0:16:13.640 and not work everyone to death. And you know, I 0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:15.760 want to put that it is worth noting like we 0:16:15.800 --> 0:16:19.960 actually did like have national nationalized railroad company for a while, 0:16:20.880 --> 0:16:25.840 and it was kind of a ship show like it. Okay, Okay, 0:16:26.280 --> 0:16:27.880 this is something that's also important. Think about this, Like 0:16:27.920 --> 0:16:29.840 there's a lot of like there's a lot of different 0:16:29.920 --> 0:16:33.760 kinds of nationalization, right Like there there there was a 0:16:33.840 --> 0:16:37.320 huge difference between a firm that's like like you know, 0:16:37.360 --> 0:16:40.080 like we we we we sort of technically nationalized a 0:16:40.080 --> 0:16:42.280 bunch of the like car companies after two thousand eight, right, 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:44.840 we bailed them out, but you know, like we like 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:46.560 when in that stuff, we didn't really like take it. 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:48.600 We did we owned, we owned like a bunch of 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:53.520 their stock. We didn't like take a control employees, and 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:57.200 like we we got like Nick Tonight like proto neoliberal 0:16:57.560 --> 0:16:59.880 nationalization of the railroads last time, and it kind of 0:17:00.000 --> 0:17:02.560 atributed so the problems we have now. There was also 0:17:02.680 --> 0:17:07.480 a period where Conrail's union was trying to like buy 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:11.080 like the railroad, so we all we almost we almost 0:17:11.080 --> 0:17:12.760 got a railroad system that was run by its by 0:17:12.760 --> 0:17:14.280 it was owned by its own union, and then the 0:17:15.080 --> 0:17:16.840 company just like refused to sell it to them because 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:18.040 they were like waiting to hold on, we can't have 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:21.399 a worker run railroad. But one thing, one thing I 0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:24.480 am interested in is I I don't actually know this. 0:17:24.560 --> 0:17:27.439 What would what would the how would how would an 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:31.199 illegal strike actually work? Like, what's what's the what is 0:17:31.240 --> 0:17:36.040 the differences between people striking illegally? Now, Like there's some 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:38.920 some discussion of that, who knows that's actually actually happened, 0:17:39.040 --> 0:17:40.679 But what is the main kind of difference between that 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:45.720 and um, the non illegal stow Okay, so the big 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:48.560 thing is Okay, So the thing about the National Labor 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:51.480 Relations Act, right, which is the thing that covers normal strikes, 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:53.920 was that like and this is also true to sem 0:17:53.960 --> 0:17:55.679 I sent under the rover, but like, okay, so if 0:17:55.720 --> 0:17:58.960 you're doing a legal strike, you have legal protections right 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:04.080 like they're they're there are things corporations can't do to you. Um, 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:06.560 like yeah, there there there, there's there's a bunch of 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:10.080 stuff that can't Like, I don't like it's it's it's 0:18:10.080 --> 0:18:12.320 a lot harder to just sort of fire people. The 0:18:12.400 --> 0:18:16.920 other thing is that also, like especially something like this, 0:18:17.600 --> 0:18:23.080 there's a like you you if you do if you 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:24.600 do a wildcat strike like this and you do you 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:27.880 specifically a strike that is like that is specifically illegal 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:31.640 under this act, like you can all get fired. Um 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:35.400 I'm I think that I think they could technically arrest you. 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:38.040 Like it's it's I don't know that that part of 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:42.520 it's not exactly clear to me, But yeah, I don't know. 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:46.280 I mean there there's sort of like I feel like 0:18:46.320 --> 0:18:49.120 if if if they arrest you just for not going 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.439 to your job, I feel like that is a I 0:18:51.440 --> 0:18:55.320 mean that that has happened to people like I know 0:18:55.359 --> 0:19:01.240 people have been yes, like in the long history of 0:19:01.560 --> 0:19:05.480 labor struggles, people have been straight up killed. Um, but 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:10.080 at least in twenty two I think it would be 0:19:10.200 --> 0:19:14.679 a bad look. Yeah, I mean I think, Okay, so 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:17.439 I think where we're headed, and I think what they 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:20.520 ought to do is just force get all of like 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:25.240 the worst criminals and I mean the murderers, the terrorists, 0:19:25.400 --> 0:19:28.479 all of those guys, and you make them run the trains. 0:19:28.640 --> 0:19:32.000 Whoever blew up all of those power transformers in North Carolina. 0:19:32.080 --> 0:19:34.919 You make them run the trains, and it'll be fine. 0:19:35.680 --> 0:19:37.800 Nothing bad will happen as a result of this. It 0:19:37.800 --> 0:19:42.280 will work out perfectly well. The the the alternative plan 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:45.520 and the thing that maybe these rail companies are just 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:49.320 holding out for because maybe they're just making conditions be 0:19:49.400 --> 0:19:52.280 not great and underpaying and not giving sick days, is 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:56.520 because they're waiting for trains just to become autonomous. They're 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:59.360 already planning to severely cut down the crews that are 0:19:59.359 --> 0:20:04.360 on the trains. There's already trains in Australia that are 0:20:04.560 --> 0:20:09.760 a totally autonomously run that carry mining materials over for 0:20:10.000 --> 0:20:13.920 hundreds of miles, and that is the future that these 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:16.159 that these companies want, because then they don't they need 0:20:16.200 --> 0:20:19.679 to pay for employees to actually run the train. Frustrating 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:23.119 because like in an actual if we were anything that 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:27.320 approached a society that like dealt with things ethically and humanely, 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:31.760 uh and equitably, then this would be good, like because 0:20:31.760 --> 0:20:34.040 it seems like working on train sucks and it would 0:20:34.040 --> 0:20:37.200 be great if we could automate most of that work. Uh, 0:20:37.240 --> 0:20:39.879 and then people less people would have to work in 0:20:39.960 --> 0:20:43.200 order to keep society running. But that's people don't have 0:20:43.240 --> 0:20:47.080 to work. We were just going to run through these 0:20:47.119 --> 0:20:52.000 people's bodies by like as we get up to autonomy automization, 0:20:52.040 --> 0:20:54.440