Ed:

Somewhere I have stored away a file folder from my N Y Tel days, that I swiped from the file cabinet where our personnel files were stored. It has my name and NCSD, (net credited service date, for you non-Bell heads) and SS# on the tab. Stamped in big letters is the notation "NOT ELIGIBLE FOR PROMOTION, PURSUANT TO EEOC RULES."

Like you, Ed, in a somewhat similar mind set, even though I WAS an employee, I figured "if I can't beat 'em, ph*ck 'em." Over the ensuing years, when our Union contracts got fatter and fatter, the company started messing with the salaries and pensions of the only class of workers that they could: first level management (foremen.) An executive friend of mine said "we consider foremen to be non-unionized craftsmen. They can't complain, 'cause if they did, we would just fire them." History proved him correct, and proved me to have been the "victim" of subsequent contracts and raises.

The last ten years of my career, working as a cable maintenance splicer, I grossed a total of $1,000,000. I routinely made $20,000 more than my boss, annually. When I retired with 30 years' service, counting the incentives, I walked away with a pension equal to that given to a worker with 46 years of service. My foreman got a lump sum when he retired the following year of $350,000. He had to pay tax on that amount, and even with creative accounting he wound up with a yearly income (interest on principal) of about $15,000. My pension plus stock options (again, a Union-created program) comes to a lot more. So much for not being the correct shade or chromosome type. The best thing they ever did to me was reverse discrimination.

The foremen once tried to organize (unionize). They met one evening in a huge hotel ballroom in midtown Manhattan, in NYC. Hundreds of them. In and amongst them were management "special agents" from the company security force. Pictures and videos were taken. The next week, every foreman who could be identified was called in to his boss's office and given a choice: Sign a "confession" and agreement never to attempt to organize, or walk out the door, with no pension. So much for their organizing attempt.

Ed, I hope you're not bitter about being turned down. From my experience in hanging out with you here, I'm sure you would have been a great asset to the company. It was, occasionally, a wonderful place to work. But it sounds like you had a great career in spite of them.


Arthur P. Bloom
"30 years of faithful service...15 years on hold"