S.Atlantic : Refinery Strike - A Naive View
Submitted by SARTMA.com (Juanita Brock) 04.02.2009 (Article Archived on 18.02.2009)
A strike during these risky economic times seems to be an unfortunate mistake and yes, this could affect this serious situation even further.
REFINERY STRIKE – A NAĎVE VIEW
An Editorial by J. Brock (FINN)
A strike during these risky economic times seems to be an unfortunate mistake and yes, this could affect this serious situation even further. Crude prices are poised to increase on the news but decreasing demand will mean that less of the product will be bought when it is finally processed and put out for sale.
Given the situation one would think that workers are striking for selfish reasons and the added gripe over foreign workers doesn’t help either. During these times workers tend to be less magnanimous and more protective of his or her own rights.
When you analyze further, a strike for better pay and conditions against one of the few entities that made huge profits while the rest of us were being stripped of our fuel budgets and later our disposable income and savings just to keep warm and have necessary transport is just the ticket.
It seems that with – in some cases – poorly maintained infrastructure and dissatisfied employees the oil companies aren’t paying adequate attention to the people who make the products. Indications are that not enough company profits are even being ‘trickled down’ to help make refineries more efficient.
Someone has huge amounts of money but it doesn’t seem to be disgruntled employees who are taking a huge risk by taking strike action.
Hopefully mediation will help to ease the problems and help employees realise better pay and conditions. It helps to talk with each other during these difficult times but at the end of the day it is satisfied employees working with well maintained equipment that will help to realise fairer prices at the pump.
RELATED NEWS
Pump prices bumped higher over the last week, a federal report showed Monday, on anxiety over a possible refinery strike that would affect more than half the nation's capacity to turn oil into gasoline, diesel and other products.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-gas3-2009feb03,0,7403088.story
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