Class 1 rail employment up a tad in February
Written by David C. Lester, Editor-in-Chief
BNSF and other western roads face more snow plowing before the arrival of spring.
BNSF
After over a year of continuous declines in Class 1 railroad employment, two things happened in February 2021.
First, the continued loss of employees was halted. Second, employment numbers ticked up slightly from January.
However, this is small comfort to those subject to layoffs as railroads align their workforces with customer and market needs. This is primarily due to rail employment having declined 11% from this time last year. U.S. Class 1 operating personnel numbered 114,968 in February 2021, which is a 0.53% increase from January 2021. However, when compared with February 2020, employment levels are down 10.6%.
Looming in the background for rail labor concerned about unemployment is the recent announcement that Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern have submitted an application to merge. There is uncertainty around how this merger would impact rail employment.
Train and engine (T&E) employment saw similar changes. This category increased by 0.6% between January 2021 and February 2021, while the year-to-year numbers were approximately 11% down.
