New York City limousine driver kills himself in protest over poverty wages

by Sandy English, WSWS

On Monday morning, Douglas Schifter, a career limousine driver, shot and killed himself in a rental car in front of New York City Hall in lower Manhattan. A suicide note explained his act was a protest against the political and corporate establishment for systematically lowering the standard of living of professional drivers.

In a defiant note posted on his Facebook account before his suicide, Schifter observed that he had been working nearly 100-120 consecutive hours a week for the last 14 years, up from 50 hours weekly in 1981 when he started to drive professionally.

“Companies do not care how they abuse us just so the executives get their bonuses,” Schifter wrote. “They have not paid us fair rates for some time now. Due to the huge numbers of cars available with desperate drivers trying to feed their families they squeeze rates to below operating costs and force professionals like me out of business. They count their money and we are driven down into the streets we drive becoming homeless and hungry. I will not be a slave working for chump change. I would rather be dead.”…

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