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The truth is they were built by workers, many of them immigrants forced to labor under near-slave conditions. Ever since, it has been workers who maintain the tracks and rolling stock and keep the railroads running.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYet railways are operated solely to boost the profits of their owners. Schedules and service have been slashed. The safety of workers and passengers alike is endangered as the rail bosses cut crew sizes, intensify the hours and pace of work, and allow tracks and equipment to deteriorate. Management and bondholders still loot the government treasury, just as when the rails were originally laid.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis book tells the story of how the building of the railroads enriched America's ruling families. It recounts the struggles by rail workers for more than a century to unite in an industrial union powerful enough to defend their job conditions and wages against the rail bosses and against strikebreaking by private goons and federal and state officials.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt explains why as long as the railroads are operated by capitalists—and the government is run by them to protect their interests—there will never be safe, convenient public transportation and freight services.\u003c\/p\u003e"}
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American Railroads: The Case for Nationalization

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Photos, drawings, charts, graphs, further reading. Now with enlarged type.

Format: Paper

135 Pages

Edition: 1st

Year: 1980

Publisher: Pathfinder Press

ISBN: 978-0-87348-600-2

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From Amazon.com: "The railroads, the first national industry, the industry on which giant battles were waged not just between the workers and the employers, but a major factor in farmers fight for land, and their continued fight for their fair share of the profits from their labor. This book talks about the railroad's real history in American capitalism, a history of class struggle, class war. This book also talks about how at a much earlier easier stage of the crisis of capitalism, the railroads themselves were torn apart by economic crisis, thousands of employees lost their jobs, and the economy of this country was thrown amuck. Read this now, because the crisis of the railroads at they were when this book was written in the 1970s is nothing compared to the growing crisis. Read this now because it is written not as nostalgic lying history, or armchair economics, but as a contribution to the need for all working people, not just railroad workers, to know what is coming, know how our predecessors have shown the way to fight, know how to win! Read this now because a crisis in the airline industry of exactly the same character with questions of nationalization is going on now. Here in Miami where the airlines are a major employer many of my friends and neighbors are afraid that their jobs will be lost. Read this book for them as well!" —Tony Thomas, reader review, February 23, 2003

American Railroads: The Case for Nationalization

By Dick Roberts, 

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History books tell us that America's railroads were built by the Robber Barons. The truth is they were built by workers, many of them immigrants forced to labor under near-slave conditions. Ever since, it has been workers who maintain the tracks and rolling stock and keep the railroads running.  ...

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