any strike was considered "...a bold gamble by an isolated union." gdl represented a mere 3 percent of deutsche bahn's workforce. no other deutsche bahn union supported the engineers' strike, nor did the german federation of trade unions, deutscher gewerkschaftsbund (dgb). but gdl had a tradition of breaking with other unions in wage negotiations. gdl also believed the time was ripe for a nationwide strike. chancellor angela merkel's government had planned to sell a 49 percent stake in deutsche bahn to the public. the union believed it had to seek its wage demands now before the privatization effort began.