Those greedy cement truck drivers! Let me drive a cement truck, I'd do it for free!

They aren't cement trucks, but I'm still gonna tell a strange story.

Years ago, I went to see the third (and least) of the Die Hard movies in the theater with some friends.

I noticed that the first few rows of the theater were packed patron-to-patron, while the rest of the theater was sparsely populated. I figured that some group had bought a bunch of tickets and all wanted to sit together.

Later in the movie, some scenes featured hundreds of dump trucks in a congo. As soon as these trucks appeared (and there was no other action in the film at that time), the first few rows of the theater stood up and screamed! From then on, every time a dump truck appeared onscreen, there was cheering from that section. It felt extremely random, as if a dump truck is so pedestrian that no one should ever cheer for it.

On the way out of the theater, as I was woefully thinking that I had just paid to see that movie, I saw a group of the people from those rows. I went up to one to ask what it was all about, and apparently he was part of the dump truck driver's union who the film company had retained to drive the trucks.

[U]nder the expired contract, drivers earned $33.11 an hour, rising to $59.01 when health insurance, pension contributions and other benefits are included.

. . . the union earlier this week demanded raises of $5 an hour in the overall compensation package each year for three years, although the union did not specify how much would go to wages and how much to benefits. . . Local 282’s president, reduced that demand to $3.50 an hour. “They didn’t give us a chance to answer the $3.50 package before they walked out,” Mr. Greco said. That $3.50 would represent a 6 percent increase in the drivers’ $59-an-hour compensation package.

Economy must be pretty good to sustain those wages.

For those wondering:

Local 282 had long been notorious because the Gambino crime family controlled it for decades. But government officials placed it into trusteeship, and Mr. La Barbera was brought in to help root out corruption. Government officials say the cleanup has been quite successful.

#### engineering, I'm going to NY to drive cement trucks!

Well, at least cranes probably won't fall on people during a construction strike.

No rush, though; we've only been working on the 2nd Avenue Subway for about a century, and it's not symbolically important or anything to have something at the WTC site other than a gaping hole.

Poor Gambinos, they never catch a break.

Economy must be pretty good to sustain those wages.

I feel similarly when I see what CEOs are getting.

$33.11 an hour is close to a living wage. Take the bites out for taxes and social security, and consider that while the drivers may not live in Manhattan, the boroughs aren't exactly cheap either, and what's left isn't really enough.

Anyone here ever done concrete work? Just curious.

$$'s like that just amaze me when I hear about how its a livable wage. I stayed with a friend in Dayton, OH for the week. The cost of living feels like 10% of that. He bought a nice condo for $60k. Making $50k a year, he lives like a king in that part of the world.

I went to see the third (and least) of the Die Hard movies

You suck, that movie was great.

Most of New York City’s largest construction projects ground to a halt or near-halt on Tuesday because of an unanticipated strike by more than 400 cement-truck drivers.

In unrelated news, there is a sudden spike in bodies left afloat in the East River.

I said "unrelated." You got a problem with that?