Pounding his chest and speaking in his typically incoherent way, Roger Toussaint proudly announced that the Transit Workers Union had basically accepted the contract offered by the MTA before they went on an illegal strike paralyzing the city for three days.

The details of the new agreement are as follows:

1. It will be a 37 month deal that will end on January 15, 2009, preventing Toussaint and his thugs (black, white, and otherwise) from walking off the job and crippling the city during the Christmas season.

2. As proposed before the strike, the 24% pay raise for workers (8% each year for three years) will be 3%, 4%, and 3.5% each year for three years; a total of 10.5% over three years, which is what the MTA was offering before the union went on their illegal strike.

3. In exchange for the MTA dropping its 6% pension contribution requirement for new hires, the union agreed to pay 1.5% of their salary toward their pension and health benefits, meaning that the average TWU membber making $55k with overtime (base pay is $47k) will pay a whopping $775 a year for health and pension benefits. This will save the MTA $32m per year.

4. Most members will be fined approximately $1000 each for their illegal work stoppage. The union will not get a bonus from the MTA to offset the fines from the strike, as they had requested at the bargaining table.

5. The MTA will provide better health care services to workers who move outside of the New York Metro area. No details were given on this point.

6. The MTA will not raise the retirement age from 55 to 62, and will not be lowered to a full pension (half-pay) at age 50 like they had originally demanded.

7. Workers will get Martin Luther King Jr. day off as a paid holiday. It’s touching to see that the MTA realizes how important it is for every black person to individually mourn his loss by taking a day off from work (kinda cool how his birthday always comes on a Monday, huh?)

8. Disciplinary actions will be handled by an outside consultant because of complaints from workers that they were disciplined too often for job performance, lateness, absence, etc.

So in review, the TWU ended up with basically the contract they walked over last week. Lots of thuggery, and an inconvenience financially to most of the working-class folks in the city ended up with the TWU achieving a contract that could’ve easily been negotiated at the bargaining table instead of the illegal picket line.

If this doesn’t wake the union up to the uselessness of the head thug, Roger Toussaint, nothing will. 6 days of pay for these people lost and this is what they walked away with. Anyone have any numbers on what Mr. Toussaint lost during the strike?

Something tells me it isn’t six days of pay.

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