Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 18, 1991                   TAG: 9104180610
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-14   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

THE NATION CAN'T AFFORD A RAIL STRIKE

Political and economic realities have changed dramatically in recent years, touching the rail industry along with others.

Despite these changes, railroads are no vestige of a bygone era. The industry remains a bulwark of America's transportation network - and central to America's economic health. Congress and the president were right to intervene so quickly.

Perhaps one sign of altered political realities was the decision by NS not to operate during the strike. In some contexts, that would reflect employer weakness. But in this context, it may reflect management strength. Making no attempt to operate the railroad put more pressure on Washington to intervene. NS seems content to let Congress settle the dispute.

It is, of course, nothing new for the federal government to play a role in relations between employers and workers. But unions in general, and the rail unions in particular, have since the 1930s looked to the White House and Capitol Hill to help protect and further their cause. While the unions still have some friends in Washington, times have changed.

It's not only a matter of the Republicans' apparent lock on the presidency, or of a continuing anti-union bias since Ronald Reagan busted the air-traffic controllers' union a decade ago. Even among the Democratic majorities in Congress, union influence has waned.

On one level, it's a case of simple arithmetic. Union membership is on the decline: The rail unions alone have lost more than 200,000 jobs since 1980. With a drop in membership, there is an accompanying decline in the number of officeholders who depend for election on union support.

On a deeper level, what's reflected is the exposure of American industry to rising competition. Domestically, the trucking industry is giving the railroads a run for their money. U.S. rail carriers also must operate efficiently to help their customers - U.S. manufacturers - market their goods efficiently in the face of international competition.

In this light, the unions' insistence on maintaining archaic work rules and obsolete crew sizes, rather than submit to job reductions via attrition and buyouts, is not even in the unions' long-term interest. Ultimately, such inefficiencies serve the interests of no one but the railroads' competitors.

The carriers, on the other hand, do not care for the wage proposals recommended by the Presidential Emergency Board, created in March 1990 to arbitrate the industry's contract-renewal issues. True, rail workers are relatively well-paid. But they have not had a raise since the last contract expired in 1988; the fruits of improved efficiencies should be shared by workers as well as managers and stockholders.

Congress has been asked by the White House to impose a settlement under the Railway Labor Act. That's hardly an ideal solution. It would be far better for the railroad companies and the unions to negotiate a new pact on their own.

Unfortunately, they haven't done so thus far. And meantime, the nation is at a sensitive moment in its business cycle. A weak economic recovery could easily be aborted. In an industry where a strike chokes off one-third of the country's flow of goods and costs the economy as much as $1 billion a day, a lengthy work stoppage is intolerable.

That's why Washington was right to intervene for now. The longer-term challenge - of overcoming traditionally adversarial labor relations and linking job security to efficiency, rather than inefficiency - remains for the carriers and unions to address.