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Tilted Cat Head
Administrator
Location: Manhattan, NY
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nice article from NYTIMES
Quote:
The strike called early yesterday by subway and bus workers had a "severe to devastating" effect on businesses, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said, denouncing the Transport Workers Union and demanding an end to the walkout. City Comptroller William C. Thompson Jr. estimated the cost to the city's economy at $400 million the first day, and $300 million for each subsequent weekday this week.
Whether or not such assessments are accurate, a drive past storefronts with their security gates locked at midday or a stroll through eerily quiet shops the week before Christmas left no doubt that the strike was inflicting widespread economic pain.
Kathryn Wylde, president of the Partnership for New York City, an alliance of hundreds of businesses, said that about 20 percent of those companies' employees were absent. Most affected, she said, were the lower-level employees who are more likely to live in the city and are most reliant on public transportation.
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The stores and restaurants so reliant on the surge of commuters into the city and the holiday boom in sales were especially injured.
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Ordinarily, commuters stream through Flushing News Island, a shop next to a No. 7 subway entrance in Flushing, Queens, but not yesterday. "I'm just sitting here," said Qamar Ali, the owner. "It's totally dead. I hope this strike ends soon, or otherwise we can't pay next month's rent."
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The drop in retail and restaurant sales also cut into the city's and the state's sales tax revenues. But the city's loss could be a gain for the suburbs and businesses with Internet sites, if shoppers who do not want to come into Manhattan decide to shop near home or online instead.
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"The nursing aides, the nannies, the store clerks, the people with back-room jobs at restaurants - these are the hardest hit, but we can't see it as readily as the big businesses," said Ms. Scanlon, who teaches at New York University. "There's a real income class difference in who can work at home on the computer and who can't, and that's one of the biggest changes from previous strikes."
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