Big Win for unemployed, sick, and injured railroad workers that restores benefits unfairly slashed over a decade ago
The newly released text of this year’s National Defense Authorization Act includes language that boosts unemployment and sick benefits to eligible railroad workers by 5.7%. Railroad workers who are laid off or sidelined by a long-term illness or significant injury will receive $940 every two weeks instead of approximately $886. That’s an additional $107 per month. The increase was included in the annual NDAA, which adopted language from the proposed Railroad Employee Equity and Fairness (REEF) Act, a legislative priority for the TWU. The House and Senate are expected to pass the NDAA and President Joe Biden will sign the bill into law by the end of the year.
“This unquestionably is the right move and a significant victory for railroad workers,” Transport Workers Union International President John Samuelsen said. “These higher payments will help workers who have fallen on hard times make ends meet. These are vital benefits. They never should have been cut in the first place. Railroad workers fell victim to only-in-Washington insidious budget gimmickry.”
“Railroad workers have been wrongfully shortchanged at the worst possible time when they needed help,” TWU Rail Division Director John Feltz said. “Restoring their benefits was a top priority for the TWU. It was a long battle, but thankfully we prevailed.”
Railroad workers are not eligible for regular taxpayer-supported Social Security programs that provide benefits such as steady income and medical insurance to retirees, the unemployed, and the disabled. Instead, such benefits provided to railroad workers are completely paid for by railroad companies and workers themselves through paycheck deductions. They are administered by the federal Railroad Retirement Board.
The 5.7% increase to current benefit levels restores payout levels that existed before a Congressional budget agreement in 2011. The compromise deal authorized raising the federal debt ceiling but only if coupled with a broad range of spending cuts to programs administered by the federal government. Even though railroad workers’ benefits are not funded by the federal government, they were included in the sequestration because they are administrated by the federal Railroad Retirement Board.
Unemployment insurance for all other workers, meanwhile, was unaffected by the 2011 cuts. Although supported by federal funds, regular unemployment is administered by the individual states.
The sequestration of RRB funds was extended, most recently by the CARES Act, as a budget gimmick. It gave the false appearance on paper that federal spending was being reduced when, in fact, the benefits administered by the RRB do not include taxpayer money.
“This was insidious budget gimmickry that caused real economic harm,” Samuelsen said.