Disruption caused by the huge cut in ScotRail services from today could cost the economy tens of millions of pounds a week, a leading Scottish economist has warned.
This month's timetable originally had around 2,150 weekday services, but these have now been reduced by a third to 1,456.
Economist Tony Mackay told the Press & Journal this move could cost the Scottish economy between £75million and £80million every week from a combination of the fall in economic output and extra money having to be spent by travellers to get to their destinations.
ScotRail services have been slashed temporarily due to a dispute with the Aslef union, whose members are refusing to make themselves available for overtime.
The rail operator was nationalised by the Scottish Government last month after the previous operator, Abellio, had its franchise ended early amid criticism of the quality of the service.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said last week it was vital to get rail services back to normal as quickly as possible.
Employment Minister Richard Lochhead said yesterday he hoped the dispute could be sorted soon.
He said: "This is a matter between ScotRail and the unions, and we're urging them as hard as we can to get this resolved as quickly as possible.
"My message to all workers in Scotland and all these sectors is we have to be sensible - everything has to be affordable because the country's in a very, very precarious position at the moment, and if we take wrong decisions we could end up with a recession in the near future which will cause a lot of damage to people's lives and local business in Scotland and our economy.
"It's not for me as a minister to say what's the right or wrong wage for a train driver or anyone else.
"But just to say that it's really important that people are compromising, being constructive, and recognise the consequences of these disputes dragging on for too long."
The Press and Journal says a typical ScotRail driver salary is more than £50,000 - with drivers having been offered a 2.2% pay rise and the opportunity to take part in a revenue share agreement which would take the total package to 5%.
But Kevin Lindsay, Aslef's Scottish organiser, hit out at Mr Lochhead's calls for people to be "sensible" over pay claims.
"From an Aslef point of view, the most sensible thing that he could do right now is to tell ScotRail to get back to the negotiating table to settle this dispute so that the ridiculous timetable cuts can be withdrawn and our railways can get back to serving the public," he added.
"It is not sensible to ask workers to accept 2.2% when inflation is heading north of 10% and it is not credible to blame workers for the state of the economy."
Scottish Labour transport spokesman Neil Bibby said: "The minister had no answers to the chaos engulfing ScotRail on the SNP's watch.
"To claim that the Government cannot act is laughable. The Government run ScotRail - therefore they own these cuts and own this crisis."