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to promote civic engagement in the Philadelphia region.Gov Rendell: SEPTA makes new offer to the union
Friday, November 6th, 2009 at 1:30 pm - by Alan Tu. Filed under: Community.
Governor Ed Rendell speaking on WHYY’s Radio Times this morning said that the SEPTA Board has revised its original contract offer and that now it’s up the union leadership to decide if it’s acceptable. Rendell said the changes were non-economic, adding that the SEPTA Board has made it clear that they don’t have anymore money to throw in. Rendell says if the deal is accepted the strike could be over before the afternoon commute.
Click below to listen. Fast foward to the -37:00 on the player’s counter to hear Governor Rendell
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But KYW’s Mike Dunn reports that a source of his within the union doubts that it’ll be accepted.
A source close to negotiations tells KYW Newradio that the union does NOT see this latest revised offer from Septa as an improvement over the earlier one. It has not been formally rejected, and the source says the new offer is still being looked at. But, the source says, at first glance it does not seem any better than the last proposal.
Feel free to tell us what you think of transit strike.
Do you support the union or management on this one?
November 6th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Hi, I support the union because I agree that the pension deal was a clawback of the pay raises. I also think the salaries are low and the raises are just normal cost-of-living increases (the transit workers can’t make a play for big payouts of a DROP program, for example). The underfunded pension plan is very serious. Would those clawbacks alone be enough to put the plan in balance? I’m thinking no, more work is needed to fix that problem.
The argument against the union sounds like “I have bad benefits and so should you” which should be a gigantic wake-up call about the quality of jobs in America. I hope this crisis will bring attention to the serious issue of insecure retirements for all regular Americans, not just the transit workers (the 401K will not go the distance for most people, as last year’s crash on Wall St should have made loud and clear).
This episode of NOW with Bill Moyers had very good information about the sorry state of our nation’s pension plans:
http://www.pbs.org/now/thisweek/index_062703.html
According to a 2003 survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) and the American Savings Education Council (ASCE), many Americans are ill-informed about just how much money they will need in retirement, and how to plan accordingly. Traditionally, retirement experts have told us to think of retirement as a “three-legged stool” comprised of personal savings, Social Security and employer sponsored pensions. These days, the stability of all three legs are being challenged - and some people are worried. This week NOW looks at how traditional pension plans are faring. Experts refer to what we think of as “traditional” pensions as “defined benefit plans.” Below you’ll find more information about these plans as well as about other increasingly popular types of pension plans.
http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/pensions.html