On Labor Day, Remembering Ronald Reagan and the Air Traffic Controllers

[BeatleBoot]

11,000 fired.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-06-10-taylor-vignette_x.htm


Fired air-traffic controller still feels the sting decades later

Reagan fired more than 11,000 air-traffic controllers in 1981 for staging an illegal strike. The move was a major blow to the power of labor unions.

Ron Taylor was fired by President Reagan 23 years ago. He's still trying to get his job back.

Taylor, 57, of Stuart, Fla., was one of more than 11,000 air-traffic controllers fired by Reagan after they went on strike for higher wages and fewer hours on the stress-filled job. In 1993, President Clinton ended the "ban for life" Reagan had imposed on former members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Association, but Taylor and thousands of others weren't rehired.

"When they talk about Reagan as compassionate, I just don't know what they are talking about," says Taylor, president of PATCO, which continues legal action to get members' jobs back

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[HughMoran]

1. I'll never forget that

That sonofabitch made me so angry that day. I was one of the moronic "Reagan Democrats" who learned to hate the man and regret their vote within the first year after his election. I've hated that man since.

[rfranklin]

2. All labor should have gone on strike across the nation...

because that was the day the tide went out for the labor unions. And we now see how the benefits and wages that the unions secured have been eroded year after year to enrich the very few.

[hfojvt]

5. I think a general strike is also illegal

Reagan would have fired all of us :scared:

[AnnInLa]

3. And, STILL going on:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AIR_SAFETY_CONFLICT?SITE=LABAT&SECTION=POLITICS&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2007-09-02-13-13-25

The nation's air traffic controllers and the Federal Aviation Administration that employs them cannot agree whether enough qualified people are guiding air traffic or how safe the air space is today.

With airline travel rebounding almost to the volume before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, delays on scheduled U.S. flights have reached a record high. Nearly one-third of domestic flights on major carriers were late in June. And air traffic is growing.

snip

"In several places, it has created a safety problem where controllers are working 10-hour days, 6-day weeks and working combined positions because they don't have enough fully trained bodies," union President Patrick Forrey said.

FAA figures show the number of fully certified controllers dropped to 11,467 in May - the lowest in a decade the union says. Beside them in control centers are 3,300 so-called "developmental controllers" who are being trained on the job by other controllers. The trainees are not yet qualified for all work assignments required of fully certified controllers.

"They are pushing the envelope and somebody is going to snap," Forrey warned. "Unless the agency slows down the traffic, someone may make a mistake and then are they going to blame it on the controller?"

By contrast, FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown said, "This is the safest period in aviation history." She said the contract allowed the agency to more easily move staff to meet the needs of a changing airline industry.

FAA Administrator Marion Blakey says the imposed contract "is saving taxpayers $1.9 billion over five years ... to invest in 21st Century air traffic systems."



The union says these national figures conceal risky situations in towers, terminal approach and at regional control centers where its members scan glowing radar screens with blips representing planes loaded with passengers they need to keep moving - and keep apart.

Some of the union's examples:

much more at link above

[hootinholler]

6. Well, they (The FAA) need to stop calling it a contract! It's not!

The FAA backed away from a contract imposing terms. Since Congress would not step in, by law the controllers are forced to accept them.

-Hoot

[hfojvt]

4. "an illegal strike"

too many people think Reagan was justified because the strike was "illegal". I wonder if the same people are outraged about the Iran/Contra activities which were also illegal. Strikes should not be illegal. What should be illegal is firing people for striking. What Reagan did should have been illegal.

This is another argument I've heard.
The air traffic controllers signed a contract agreeing not to strike and they violated that contract.

When I started working for the Federal Government I had to take an oath. One line in the oath said "I am under no compulsion to take this oath." I thought, very briefly, of saying something like "Well, if I am under no compulsion to take this oath, then I won't take it." Except I was fairly certain the response would be "Then you don't have a job." That right there is pretty fu$%ing strong compulsion isn't it?

My point being that when somebody is coerced, or leveraged, into taking an oath or signing a contract which they later find to be extremely deleterious to their well-being, then they are NOT the bad guys if they violate that oath or break that contract. Contracts, like laws, are too often set up to establish the privileges of the rich and powerful.

[Freddie Stubbs]

9. Has any member of Congress tried to change the law to make such a strike legal?

:shrug:

[knitter4democracy]

7. I'd forgotten it was that many.

So very wrong. I'm seriously considering that 9/11 strike--what if all workers went on strike and got in the streets? Could they fire everyone?

[Fierce]

8. PATCO was one of the few unions to endorse Reagan.

Unions today would do well to remember that.