Posted on 04/30/2011 6:43:13 AM PDT by Daffynition
Take a good look at the person handing out dollars and coins in that toll booth on the New Jersey Turnpike or Garden State Parkway.
You are seeing an endangered species.
The New Jersey Turnpike Authority, which oversees the Turnpike and Parkway, ratified an agreement today to extend the contract of toll collectors for two more years. Unions agreed to a series of concessions, including salary cuts of about 25 percent from around $65,000 a year to $49,500 annually by the end of the contract.
But the intention is to eliminate all toll collecting jobs when the contract expires June 30, 2013.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
Surefire way to stop the skimming. Force everyone to use EZ-Pass.
$65,000 a year...to sit in a toll booth?
so they are fazing out glorified cashiers????? they were making 65000, for doing nothing????
wtf?
and now they cut the pay to 490000??? oh those poor babies....
again, wtf?
You have to have political connections to get one of those jobs. I’m shocked that they are being eliminated.
Just as long as none of the funds collected through EZPass go to line the coffers of the Teamsters Union, which is the union the toll collectors belong to.
Disgusting, greedy racket those toll booths. I’ve seen a more than 50% increase in the tolls in the last two years in PA and it is not going to road work. It all goes straight to union wages, union benefits, and union pension.
EZ pass, what a great way to let everybody know where you are. Just wait until they start sending out speeding tickets based on elapsed time between two points. Maybe there is a way to pay off the national debt without spending cuts or raising taxes after all.
And just think of all the jobs that will be created. Building thousands upon thousands of EZ pass toll crossings, government employees overseeing every detail. Wow, it could bring us out of the depression!
It was like driving into a highway prison where you had to bribe the guards to get off the damn thing. It was definitely a mob run operation.
There were thousands of impoverished Turn Pikers with their families who didn't have the bread to get off it camped out on the shoulders and medians begging and scrounging until they could scrape enough together to pay the tollbooth screws for their freedom.
A more depressing place I ain't never seen before.
Probably includes a figure for a generous health & retirement package. Just sayin'.
I hope you had the decency to toss one of your baloney samwiches out the window at least.
What do they do when they have to pee?
You may be right, but even so, where in the private sector, can you collect $65,000 per year in pay and benefits for such work?
The PA turnpike tolls were set up to cover the cost of the road, road repair, salaries, etc. for the PA turnpike ONLY. That fund was raided for general road funds and whenever SEPTA needed an infusion of cash from the state.
Two years... end of Zero’s term... that’s about right... no one will be using the tollways because there won’t be any gasoline.
If the government ever acheived 100% enforcement of the speed limit, there would be a national rebellion. People only accept the current speed limits because they know there’s only a small random chance of getting a ticket, and the occasional ticket cost is just considered the price of getting where you are going.
Nobody is going the speed limit. When I drive the limit occasionally, I pass nobody, and I am passed constantly. Tell every driver they will get ticketed if they don’t slow down, and they will show up at the polls and vote out the incumbents. And the incumbents know this — that’s why we haven’t implemented any automated procedures which would easily catch all speeders.
“$65,000 a year...to sit in a toll booth?”
If it was that easy! They also take money and sometimes give change back :)
On a serious note: their lungs must be messed up
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