Comments on: BART pay, benefits so lavish that workers deserve 0% raise

By: Eli

Eli — Fri, 18 Oct 2013 17:44:03 +0000

Why aren’t these “people” just fired? It is a low skilled job any high school kid or recovering alcoholic can do with a couple weeks of training. If they don’t like what they are getting, which is ample, then they should leave like all the citizens with REAL courage who work without union despots telling them to strike, how to vote on measures, etc.

By: Bert

Bert — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 18:26:34 +0000

Those of you who claim that the psychology behind those of us complaining that BART, its management, and its unions are all overpaid amounts to nothing more than jealousy and that we just don’t know how to fight to get paid for what we’re worth seriously have your heads up your sphincters. That is not why you don’t have our support. We know how to fight for what we believe we are worth. We can negotiate our pay with our employers without a union. If that doesn’t work, we negotiate with our feet. We get up and go elsewhere.

What you guys fail to understand is that your “negotiations” are actually taking hostages. Who do you think pays your wages? Does Gracie just pull your salaries out of her butt? Does she just march over to the Fed and ask them to print you guys more money? No. We, the 400K riders pay your salaries through our fares. We, the millions of bay area taxpayers pay your fares and we expect service for it. When you march out as part of your extortion plan, you kill the livelihood of workers who depend on public transportation to get to their places of work: day laborers, waiters. You kill the business of small business owners who depend on critical mass afforded by public transportation to give them business. You make all of us 73-100 million dollars a day poorer by killing our ability to work.

So stop accusing us of being ideological shills for right wing nut jobs. We are not ideologues. We are realists, who believe in a balanced approach to building the home we call the bay area. One that values a balance between innovation, growth, personal liberties and the rights to still collectively bargain – a good balance that keeps living here worthwhile. When you throw bargaining out the window and instead hold us hostage under the guise of class warfare when what you’re really doing is extorting the people that live here, all you are forwarding are the interests of crony capitalism.

Take the 8% raise, get back to work, or else face the wrath of the people. And believe me, the people will protest – both in person outside BART and the SEIU headquarters, and with our votes and money.

By: Sigmarlin

Sigmarlin — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 01:23:27 +0000

This is terrible logic. Your salary states $83,000 is the average including MANAGEMENT. Management is not going on strike; they are not in a union. I agree if you want to bitch about bloated salaries and paper pushers who do nothing…but those people are not the union workers going on strike.

This is some really disingenuous math…

By: Richard Rider

Richard Rider — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 15:56:32 +0000

Yeah, sure — govt workers are held to higher standards, so we have to pay ’em more. RIIGGGGHHHHHHTTTTTT.

A couple nights ago Jay Leno’s monologue included the story of a govt bus driver who was caught masturbating while driving a busload of people. He got suspended.

SUSPENDED???????????? What’s a govt worker got to do the get FIRED???

By: Richard Rider

Richard Rider — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 15:52:16 +0000

Actually, they deserve a pay and benefit CUT — bringly them a little closer to the private sector compensation level. None will leave (except to retire), and hundreds of qualified people will apply for any job opening.

If the job opening is aggressively advertised, THOUSANDS would apply. Which, of course, is why job openings are only advertised sufficiently to meet minimum legal standards.

By: Ni4Ni

Ni4Ni — Sat, 06 Jul 2013 23:49:54 +0000

I hear BART train operators also drive Asiana Airlines’ jetliners on weekends.

By: Ni4Ni

Ni4Ni — Sat, 06 Jul 2013 22:42:28 +0000

BART’s operation isn’t much different than Disney’s Matterhorn ride, except Matterhorn’s operators are intelligent, smiling, engaging… and the Matterhorn’s cars don’t smell like puke & urine.
Terminate ALL BART employees, kill the union, bring in the National Guard to run the operation until private management can take over and run BART like a sustainable, profitable business.

By: Tough Love

Tough Love — Fri, 05 Jul 2013 23:34:04 +0000

SeeSaw, There are bad operators in every occupation. Example …. the occasional Airline pilot ready to fly while intoxicated.

Overcompensating ALL Public Sector workers, as is routine today, won’t solve that problem.

By: David

David — Fri, 05 Jul 2013 22:18:25 +0000

A friend of mine said, “During the strike… I saw a woman hold two picket signs under her arm get into the drivers seat of a new pPrsche 2 blocks away from a bart station on Monday.”

I guess she spent all her cash on Porsche and has and needs more funds to keep those.

By: SeeSaw

SeeSaw — Fri, 05 Jul 2013 21:41:37 +0000

Metrolink had an outsourced, part-time worker driving the train–he killed 26 people, because he was texting instead of watching the lights. It is simply unbelievable to me that the lives of people on a Metrolink depend on the reactions of the driver, instead of an automatic system to stop the train, when a collision with another train is imminent. I hope the BART trains are not operated that way too; if so, I sure would want the operators to be governmentally hired and trained–full time, with benefits.