In the coming year or so, the Surface Transportation Board will determine whether to approve or block Union Pacific’s $85-billion acquisition of Norfolk Southern. This signals an attempt by Wall Street to squeeze yet more from this critical infrastructure in order to maximize returns for shareholders.
Why railroad workers are fighting the proposed UP-NS Merger
Railroad workers, in particular, find themselves in a difficult situation. Being divided into several different unions, workers and their union leaders are often forced to choose between accepting concessions for their own particular craft and holding out in the name of industry-wide solidarity. A UP-NS merger involves even higher stakes, as it could very well result in significant cuts to the workforce resulting from the elimination of redundancies between the newly-combined railroads.
To better understand the dilemmas faced by workers in the fight ahead, and to help us pick apart the smokescreens that UP and NS are promulgating in an effort to charm workers into submission, we got in touch with Ron Kaminkow. Ron is a longtime ally and collaborator of Solutionary Rail’s. He is also a co-founder, former general secretary, and current trustee of Railroad Workers United (RWU), a cross-union caucus of railroad workers that aims to build industry-wide solidarity to more effectively stand up to Wall Street’s railroads.
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