(New York — Jim O’Grady, WNYC) MTA Chairman Jay Walder says unions have to agree to freeze their wages–or straphangers will have to pay more.

The MTA is hiking fares later this month–and is also planning another 7.5% increase in 2013. But Walder warns that fare hike will be even larger if unions don’t help out.

He told a State Assembly committee that labor hasn’t “played an active part” in helping the MTA face its budget crisis. Walder says he’ll only agree to cost of living raises if the unions match them with increased productivity or fewer benefits.

Of the agency’s more than thirty unions, all but three are negotiating a new contract or will begin to do so in the next year.

Transport Workers Union spokesman Jim Gannon described Walder’s style as “take it or leave it” and didn’t think it would succeed. “That’s not the way we do business,” he said.