While the strike may not specifically be about negotiating wages, the strike is, nonetheless, very much about money.

The money can be pushed around and labled different things, and can be called "not wages," but ultimately, the strike is about there being a finite pot of money, and about the UTU trying to get more than a finite pot of money through avenues other than increased wages.

For example, the UTU has lately been trying to exceed the finite pot of money's capacity by gunning for increased CalPers benefits.

Earlier, they were trying to exceed the finite pot of money's capacity by insisting that month-long leaves of absence with full medical benefits be retained, while at the same time asking for more liberal medical contributions.

The list goes on.

But ultimately, there is a limit to the money, and the UTU simply refuses to accept this when it is laid out in black and white. Their demands "morph" when it becomes obvious that it is not fiscally possible to fulfill their demands. They label the laying out of fical reality in black-and-white terms "throwing a moneky wrench in the works."

A person very close to the negotiations that I communicated with directly said that the UTU is very difficult to negotiate with because they are "a moving target."

I absolutely assure you, regardless of what the UTU may say, it IS about money. Ironically, even though the strike is very much about money, the strikers have become so stubborn and intransigent that they are actually LOSING money in their pursuit of more money. So, in that sense, the strike is not about money, but about dogged blind ego.

Ultimately, however, it seems very much the case that the only thing will satisfy the UTU is a contract giving them MORE money, in some way shape or form, even if they lose money during the strike to get it. That appears the only way they will be satisfied. It reminds me a little of that phrase wbout carpet bombing in the Vietnam War: They had to destroy the village to save it. That seems a little bit like what the UTU is doing. They will bomb their own savings accounts into oblivion, and drive the Metro further into debt, make a few short-term ego-satisfying benefits.

The UTU may say the strike is about respect and pride, but my read is that it is simply about being bizarrely bullheaded for no good reason. It is about blind stubborness in the face of clear financial facts. The UTU seems to be hard-wired to fight, and that is that.

Say it isn't about wages, if you please; but do not make the error of thinking that it is not about money. It is very much about money.