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oe Biden is calling on Congress to step up and intervene to avert a pending rail strike which could cripple the US economy as rail transport services for goods ground to a halt. Experts warn the strike could begin as early as December 9th, and trigger a cataclysmic economic impact if it stops all rail shipping.
Biden asked legislators to enact the tentative deal which had been struck in May, but which the unions failed to ratify, “without any modifications or delay – to avert a potentially crippling national rail shutdown” and added that up to 765,000 Americans “could be put out of work in the first two weeks alone.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said it was her intention to take it up this week, “to prevent a catastrophic nationwide rail strike, which would grind our economy to a halt.”
400 groups issued a call on Monday for Congress to intervene in the labor standoff, to avert billions of dollars worth of economic losses.
Any potential strike could bring rail shipping to a standstill, freezing almost 30% of US cargo shipments by weight. The resulting supply chain disruptions and shortages would supercharge an already rampant inflation, as it costs the economy $2 billion per day, and affects a myriad of sectors from energy, to agriculture, to manufacturing, to the healthcare and retail sectors
