The U.S. Senate on Thursday passed legislation to avert a freight rail strike that would have a devastating impact on the national economy. The measure will next head to President Joe Biden to be signed into law.
Following action in the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday, the Senate approved a measure that would implement arbitrated agreements between unions and railroad owners to avert a pending Dec. 9 work stoppage. While eight of the 12 rail unions, and a portion of the SMART-TD membership, had previously approved negotiated agreements, the legislation would require the remaining unions to abide by the new agreements.
According to the Association of American Railroads (AAR), the contracts now in place will provide a 24 percent wage increase during the five-year period from 2020 through 2024, including an immediate payout on average of $16,000 upon ratification; include $5,000 in performance bonuses, with total average annual pay and benefits reaching $160,000 by the end of the contract period; and provide an additional paid personal leave day per year.
“The Senate acted with leadership and urgency with today’s vote to avert an economically devastating rail work stoppage,” said AAR President and CEO Ian Jefferies. “As we close out this long, challenging process, none of the parties achieved everything they advocated for. The product of these agreements is a compromise by nature, but the result is one of substantial gains for rail employees. More broadly, all rail stakeholders and the economy writ large now have certainty about the path forward.”
Biden had called on the legislature to act and had urged the Senate to put a bill on his desk for signature quickly. “Without the certainty of a final vote to avoid a shutdown this week, railroads will begin to halt the movement of critical materials like chemicals to clean our drinking water as soon as this weekend,” Biden said in a statement Wednesday prior to the Senate’s vote.
A rail strike could have disrupted auto supply chains, food supply chains and the nation’s ability to remove hazardous waste from gasoline refineries as early as this weekend, he said.