Pros
You get great training on how to be an amateur lawyer and learn how to stick up for yourself very well since you constantly have to prove your innocence at work. You also greatly inhance your BS meter since you are constantly lied to by management.
Cons
Oh boy, where to start!? I have 20 years with this company and it is just a bad place to work. I was promised to make a 6 figure income with-in a few years 20 years ago when I hired out. I left a job that paid $65,000 back then and it took 15 years to to make that much again. I have had oppertunities to make almost 100,000 a year but it requires giving the company 80 to 100 hours a week of my time working and being away from home "which by the way they don't pay you for when they force you out of town or to stay in their disgusting unclean company hotels"! It was a good place to work but the way they treat their employees is inhumane and degrading now. Also the pay hasn't kept up with inflation and now I make a smidge more than some of the college kids serving and restaurants! That is based off a 40 hour work week. You could make more but will have to work a road trio for 12 to 14 hours then stay in a dirty railroad hotel away from your family for 16 hours and work another 12 to 14 hour train back to your hometown. Then you will get 10 to 12 hours with your family "most of which you will use to sleep" then do the 40 to 44 hour trip all over again! Then you might make 100,000 a year but you gotta do that all year long! Also the medical benefits used to be top notch. Now it is comparable to any other average job out there so don't let them fool you by saying they are good because they used to be but not anymore. The union can never get decent pay raises either. It doesn't matter what president is in office they always get tiny pay raises with contracts and boost that they did a good job negotiating. In comparison my pay is about 75% higher than when I hired out 20 years ago. But the average house in my area costs 300% more than 20 years ago. Food is at least 100% more. Cars are like 150% more. Utilities are 200% more, And just about everything I can think of has at least doubled. My pay hasn't doubled that's for sure! It's not even close to average inflation. If you factor in $400 the union takes per month and how much monthly insurance is taken out then my 75% increase in pay over 20 years goes down even more. Then the union takes $400 bucks a month, "that includes job insurance which you pretty much have to buy because you WILL get fired at some point for something." Anyways this old dog doesn't like learning nee tricks so I trying to hold out for retirement but if your young and considering the Union Pacific take my advice and go to college and get a job that will make you happy. This job WILL NOT make you happy.