>way of socializing the risk of shareholders at the expense of labor.
The strike would socialize the risk of employees/rail companies at the expense of the public who on average are far closer to the poverty line than the median rail worker.
If the companies are backstopped by the govt prohibiting a strike, they will go down to the absolute lowest level tolerable, until people retire and nobody is willing to take on that job. Likely, we'd see what happens in other industries that create a bimodal tiered system, where the grandfathered employees are still paid well while the newer tier are paid a fraction. Or, wages will stagnate until the equivalent occurs.
Again, taxing the companies will make sure incentives are more aligned between workers, shareholders, and the public. The problem with one-sided approaches is that it's very easy to levy a fine that someone else has to pay. The public and the shareholders can favor an ever-rising tax as long as long only the employees are burdened with it. Taxing the company will ensure that everyone is incentivized to find a reasonable taxation level.
Theorize the govt owns land that has the sole unobtanium mine that the fulfills some public necessity. I have the only equipment that can process the ore. You have the only skillset to operate it. Overtime, my contract terms get to a point that you feel is unreasonable. But the govt says you can't walk away because the public needs their unobtanium. Your solution is that the government tax you for the privilege to continue to mine - which they've also said you can't walk away from. Meanwhile, I pay no penalty to continue to press you for less favorable contract terms so that I can make ever increasing profits. Does that sound like a reasonable arrangement or is it marching towards a Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas scenario?
By taxing me instead, it forces me to find the right level of salary to you, rates to the public, and profits for myself. Everybody has skin in the game, unlike when your scenario that gives you an ultimatum you can't walk away from.
Taxing an activity makes it happen less. If the gov't want fewer railroad workers (or in your hypothetical example, mining equipment operators), they'd tax them like this! there'd be fewer operators as a result, and any shortage of them will cause problems. These operators aren't slaves - they can quit the industry.
The gov't would instead tax those employees _less_, in order for them to keep more of their wages, and thus encourage more of them to exist.
As a matter of imperfect pragmatism I would support a bill that equally collects from the employees and employer as it would still be some way of extracting rent from land provided freely by public for a service they were cut off from.
>Your solution is that the government tax you for the privilege to continue to mine
No my solution isn't to tax for the privelege to mine, it's to tax for damages for loss of use of public lands that were only given up conditionally so they could be used productively by employees and employers of the railroad.
2) already addressed this once, but that is $130k in total compensation. I don’t have enough information to fully gauge their fringe benefits, but it’s not uncommon for them to total as much as 50% of total compensation. Additionally, rail engineers are often on call 24/7. So is, say, $75k in salary luxurious given no sick days, 24/7 on call, physically demanding job, and lots of travel, for what the country is saying is a critical role? It doesn’t seem so to me. That’s in todays dollars that will be eroded in the future if the companies have their druthers. It doesn’t seem like the great deal you’re painting it as when ignoring the total picture.
3) again, the land easements are to the company, not the employee. So it doesn’t follow that you want to tax the employee for a right given to the employer. It’s such odd logic that it comes across as a trolling effort
