Building Bridges: Greek Meltdown; Mass Transit Unions Fight Cuts - 27:51

TWU Local 100 – Keep America Moving - Fighting Layoffs
FeaturingJohn Samuelsen, President, TWU, Local 100
Rev. Jesse Jackson, President, Rainbow PUSH Coalition
Larry Hanley. ATU International Vice President

2500 Transit workers and supporters rallied at NYC’s Penn Station in an event timed to coincide with other actions taken around the nation to protest the insufficiency of federal funding for mass transit. The Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke as part of the Keep America Moving Coalition, an alliance of transit workers, advocates for workers and the poor, and environmentalists. For Local 100, the event was not only about Keep America Moving, but also about the immanent layoff of hundreds of Station Agents with threats of many more layoffs in other titles including bus drivers. Union members expressed their profound anger over the firings, which are seen as unnecessary because of the availability of $140 million in federal stimulus funds which could be used to cover operating expenses.
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The Greek Meltdown
with
Prof. Costas Panayotakis, Professor of Sociology,NYC College of Technology, CUNY.

After weeks of massive, tumultuous worker protests over the austerity measures being forced on the Greece as part of the EU rescue package, the measures were approved by the Greek Parliament and the leaders of the European Union. The $146 billion three-year package would indirectly bail out the European banks that hold most of the Greek debt.by attempting to solve the crisis on the backs of ordinary Greeks. It raises taxes as well as imposes deep cuts in public sector wages and pensions in both public and private sectors. If it indeed works as intended, it will intensify the Greek recession, unemployment and poverty. This may exacerbate the very debt crisis it is supposed to solve

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