Workers on Bucharest’s metro system will tomorrow begin an indefinite strike that will see the entire metro grind to a halt from 05:00-16:00 each day. (To conform with labour law the metro will run from 16:00-23:00 each day, though with delays expected).
The effect on the city’s traffic and transport infrastructure will be devastating. More than 600,000 people use the metro everyday: they will all now be required to make their journeys by bus, car, taxi, tram or bike.
Expect the city to be paralyzed, basically.
RATB, which runs the city’s buses, have said that they will be running an extra 200 buses during the morning rush hour, but that is no real solution: it will simply put another 200 vehicles on the city’s already gridlocked streets.
And what are the metro workers striking for? More money. This despite the fact that they got a 23 per cent wage rise last year, and that the average take home pay of a metro worker is currently 2,600 lei per month. Far more than teachers and a large number of doctors and medical sector workers.
Bucharest Life’s solution? Sack the lot of them. Every single metro worker who fails to show up for work tomorrow. Out on their ears.
Replace them with workers currently unemployed who would be happy to do the job for the same money (or even less).
After all, that’s what would have probably happened 30 years ago, when the metro first opened. For yes, an unhappy birthday it may well be, but today is indeed the Bucharest metro’s 30th birthday. More about the history of the Bucharest metro here.
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
@Davin: no, it’s the other way around – why don’t people who have money drive very expensive cars and buy very expensive clothes so that everyone can see them?
After all that’s the whole idea of having money – to show them around; because you only eat with one mouth and only sleep in one bed so you can fulfill your basic needs with little money. If you have big money you have to show them around.
And the rest of the world should take account and work harder or steal with more accuracy or do whatever they do in order to show off themselves too.
You know, if there’s any reason to believe that Romania will turn out to be a developed country, then that’s the reason; because most people can’t sleep at night knowing that their relatives/friends/neighbours have more money than they do. This creates competition, most people won’t just settle for what they have. And the ones who can’t compete leave the country saying it’s hell on earth over here.
Why don’t Bucharestians get hp and trendy and ride bikes like they do in normal European cities
Where I come from it’s cool to have lots of money in the bank but not show it. That’s what I do. Being fitze in 2009 looks immature and ignorant and uneducated to me. It’s way more cool to have money in the bank and be able to spend it when you want to but wield power with stealth. That’s what the properly rich do. I am sorry to say but the nouveaux riche here in Bucharest who always insist on driving a car look way passé to me. It may have been cool in the early 2000s when Bucharest first emerged form the dark ages and it was finally possible to drive something other than a 55 horsepower Dacia 1310, but these days people need to get over that nice car. It’s just an inanimate object!!!
actually today (Tuesday) wasn’t that bad as I aspected. It only took me 40 minutes from Obor to Pt.Victoria by tram (had to let pass 2 trams because I couldn’t enter because it was too crowded) at about 7:30 in the morning
without kidding, it really wasn’t dad bad; but I would prefer not to have to repeat it every day…
@Craig: of course, if it takes a metro strike to hit Basescu then let there be strike for a month!
If the metro workers got the kind of raise they are demanding then there would be similar claims made by all public sector workers: just at a time when the state should be reducing the number of employees it has to pay each month. That the metro workforce deserves (or not) more money is in many ways irrelevant: the system is overstaffed and needs to shed jobs first (look at the front of every metro train: always two people in the driver’s cab. You only need one). The unions need to face up to the fact that the whole public sector in Romania is twice as big as it needs to be.
The government is also at fault here, however: cuts in public sector workers should have been made in the boom years, when those made redundant could have easier found work in the private sector.
Lastly, do not underestimate the political aspect of this strike: the leader of the metro workers is a staunch PSD man. Bringing out the brothers this close to Sunday’s election can only take votes away from the government’s man (Basescu).
@everyone: as a matter of fact I still don’t understand what chances does a Romanian have as an expat in London. Because most of the jobs that I found required certain qualifications and papers.
And inspite of this situation, they left for London with the tens of thousands! Obviously they could do nothing else than steal, sleep in parks and garbage cans, etc…
Bureaucracy is a threat to mankind itself! If the end of the Earth comes in 2012 it will be because we have to obtain too many papers in order to avoid it!
@Patrick James: you know, I was curious and I searched for jobs on London Gumtree and I computed some wages; for example if you work as a door guard in London you can earn 8 pounds / hour. Multiplied by 22 days that means 1408 pounds / month. If you take out 408 pounds (at least) because you have to pay the rent, it leaves you with 1000 pounds that have to be spend according to London standards.
Don’t know about you, but I’d rather spend 540 pounds in Bucharest than 1000 pounds in London!
P.S.: it would be very hard for a Romanian to find any other job in London than as a doorguard; however, in the UK qualifications are needed even for that (!)
@Craig: correct me if I’m wrong
@Peter: imagine what it would be like if we had to live for another 50 years without the West to support us… we’d probably become cavemen in no time
@Craig, I completely agree with you. This is not a time to ask for more money.
@Patrick, their sallary is way better than other people with the same education. Unfortunatly the romanian economy just can’t support any more random sallary increases, thanks to the idiots that are in charge now.
I’m not saying they don’t deserve more money (even though, truth be told, they should get along fine with 2600 ron), but we need a nice couple of years of economic growth until we can afford to pay more.
A strike snowball effect is exactly what we don’t need right now and it’s pretty sad people just don’t get it.
Parmalat the end of the world in 2012? No problem for Romania, after all they’re 50 years behind! (This joke’s from “Hammer & Tickle” by Ben Lewis, an old joke from communist times which is still valid these days!)
2600 lei = £540 according to my currency converter.
That is very low money indeed. I know of course that in Romania things are much cheaper than in the UK where I live, but I feel that if people start to demand what they feel they are worth this will be a good thing.
If the metro workers can improve their pay then the teachers and doctors will have a better chance of more pay as well.
Higher paid workers spend more and so the economy can benefit as a whole.
Why sack them and not sack the whole country? It’s useless anyway.
Maybe the end of the Earth will come in 2012 and we won’t be witnessing any metro strikes anymore…