The strike ends, but the unions stink anyway!

Toronto’s internal and external municipal workers belonging to two unions walked out from their jobs 36 days back, demanding higher pay and other benefits at a time when the looming recession in the country was/is sparing nobody, …literally. Striking city employees know that they can paralyze city’s services, and their union patrons left no stone unturned in arm-twisting the city to succumb to their outrageous demands. Seriously, what makes the unions think that they deserve better treatment than their fellow citizens? So their already prevailing higher entitlements, government-pace of work and job security weren’t sufficient, eh?

The most visible impact of the strike was the stalling of garbage collection. At numerous locations in the city, garbage was seen strewn around the garbage bins. The City of Toronto converted certain open spaces as dumps, where people could throw their garbage. Some individuals and communities voluntarily put garbage bags on the street, trying to minimize littering. I also read about random volunteer drives to clean up certain stretches of streets.

Seriously, what could be more deploring than a bunch of unionized public sector employees holding an entire city ransom with their unreasonable demands? The strike ended yesterday in some deal that both, the city and the unions, called successful. I just want to see my tax dollars spent well.

I think that public sector unions are irrelevant today. They seem to exist only to cause menace, nothing else.