NJ Recalls

[X-rated]

Oh so you're the authority on what we "should" make?

Point SO missed... Where did I say anything about how much you should make? You guys are the ones who agreed to the amount of your raise, its terms and the structure. There is a time value to money which was absolutely considered by management and likely considered by the more astute among your membership. I just pointed out no one has lost money due to inflation. Your raise just wasn't the windfall you thought it was if you didn't consider net present value.

 

[gunfyter]

All of you are conveniently forgetting the length of the term was considered by both sides in 2007, and the size of the raise you received reflected it. !

This is not forgotten ... It must be taken into account again. As does the $100K more my buddies at SWA make more than I do

 

[imacdog]

Point SO missed... Where did I say anything about how much you should make? You guys are the ones who agreed to the amount of your raise, its terms and the structure. There is a time value to money which was absolutely considered by management and likely considered by the more astute among your membership. I just pointed out no one has lost money due to inflation. Your raise just wasn't the windfall you thought it was if you didn't consider net present value.

Uh huh, which is why we need a decent raise just to keep the payscale equivalent to what it was when the 2007 contract passed in terms of buying power today. Everyone knew at the time there would be no inflation adjustment unless the contract was extended, and everyone, save G4, understands that we need a raise to keep the same buying power as we had when the contract was first passed.

 

[jonjuan]

This is not forgotten ... It must be taken into account again. As does the $100K more my buddies at SWA make more than I do

Swa is wildly profitable and has been for 40 years in a row.

 

[realityman]

Swa is wildly profitable and has been for 40 years in a row.

And with the exception of '08 and '09, so have we.

This company has been making lots and lots of money for many years now. It's a shame some buy into the company propaganda that's been put out over the years of how they were losing money, or were barely making a profit. Whatever.

Those of us who have been here since the 90's have watched this game play out. I'll never forget during our fight for the '05 contract how the union asked for an audit of the "books", since they were crying so poor and couldn't pay us any more. The company generously agreed, sort of. The union was allowed the most general of overviews. A couple pages that basically showed Netjets, Inc. was losing money. The thing is, Netjets, Inc. included all the Netjets subsidiaries: NJA, NJI, EJM, NJME, and most importantly, NJE. I say NJE because this one was the kicker. You see, it was the worst kept secret around the company that Netjets was using large profits from NJA to start and run NJE, which always seemed to be losing money. NJA floated NJE for years. In fact, they've done it up until recently, when NJE finally turned a small profit.

The union knew this too, so they asked for a forensic audit of the books. Man, you should have seen the company run from that!

And there were other tricks too the company would use to siphon away profits from NJA so they could show a loss. I'll never forget signing the bill at our own facility in HPN (being run by EJM, another Netjets subsidiary) where we charged ourselves $90 for a quart of oil. Or $200 for a lav service. Or ridiculously high ramp fees. Oh, and paying retail, or more, for training at FSI (another BH company). This was confirmed by more than a few sources.

NJA had been making PLENTY of money. And the proof came after we signed our CBA in '05. The very same CBA that the company, and many folks outside, including here, said would bankrupt the company. Because after we signed it NJA went on to make, and report, record profits in a very short timeframe. Wow, the turnaround was nothing short of miraculous, if you believed their lies about how much they had been losing. We're talking about less than a year from "OMG! We're losing a ton of money and paying you anymore is going to be the final nail in the company coffin!" to we're making so much money we can light our cigars with $100 bills! Amazing how much money we "made" when there was no more contract negotiations.

Do a little homework about NJA before making comments about profitability. This place is a cash cow. They can afford, easily, to pay us a great deal more.

 

[X-rated]

Uh huh, which is why we need a decent raise just to keep the payscale equivalent to what it was when the 2007 contract passed in terms of buying power today. Everyone knew at the time there would be no inflation adjustment unless the contract was extended, and everyone, save G4, understands that we need a raise to keep the same buying power as we had when the contract was first passed.

Imacdog,

I honestly don't want to argue with you, but you're still not getting what I'm saying because you still think you should use 2007 buying power as your benchmark. Assume a pilot got a raise to 140K per year in 2007. Seven years later, he would have received 980,000 actual dollars. However, The NPV of 140K per year for 7 years at 3 percent inflation is $794,164 or 113,452 per year in 2007 dollars. At 2 percent, which is closer to where we've really been in the past 7 years, it would be 121,696 per year in 2007 dollars. It's a false premise to use 140K because that's not what you negotiated. You negotiated 140K per year for 7 years. At two percent assumed inflation, the assumed pilot could have received a raise to 121,696 per year plus 2 percent cola and it would have been exactly equal to 140K per year for 7 years. It's just math.

note: To be fair, I compounded monthly because I'm too lazy to build a spreadsheet, but this is pretty close and illustrates my point. Compounding every 12 months to represent annual instead of monthly COLA increases would give you a slightly higher 2007 equivalent salary.

Fight for as much as you think you can get. I'm just pointing out the academic inaccuracy of using the 2007 buying power as your starting point. That's not what was negotiated or agreed to by the bean counters. They understand and think in terms of NPV. Most pilots probably don't.

 

[G4dude]

Are you?

He is an authority on what he thinks is right, as am I, and as are you. What are y'all, six years old?

 

[G4dude]

Swa is wildly profitable and has been for 40 years in a row.

SWA has an increasingly senior complement of captains, driving cost per mile higher, especially since SW was conceived as a low cost carrier, I believe. I see storm clouds on the horizon for them,like what Delta and United, et al, went through. Hopefully I am wrong. Usually am.

 

[imacdog]

Imacdog,

I honestly don't want to argue with you, but you're still not getting what I'm saying because you still think you should use 2007 buying power as your benchmark. Assume a pilot got a raise to 140K per year in 2007. Seven years later, he would have received 980,000 actual dollars. However, The NPV of 140K per year for 7 years at 3 percent inflation is $794,164 or 113,452 per year in 2007 dollars. At 2 percent, which is closer to where we've really been in the past 7 years, it would be 121,696 per year in 2007 dollars. It's a false premise to use 140K because that's not what you negotiated. You negotiated 140K per year for 7 years. At two percent assumed inflation, the assumed pilot could have received a raise to 121,696 per year plus 2 percent cola and it would have been exactly equal to 140K per year for 7 years. It's just math.

note: To be fair, I compounded monthly because I'm too lazy to build a spreadsheet, but this is pretty close and illustrates my point. Compounding every 12 months to represent annual instead of monthly COLA increases would give you a slightly higher 2007 equivalent salary.

Fight for as much as you think you can get. I'm just pointing out the academic inaccuracy of using the 2007 buying power as your starting point. That's not what was negotiated or agreed to by the bean counters. They understand and think in terms of NPV. Most pilots probably don't.

That's nice. You're right though in that it isn't appropriate to start with 2007 buying power, as that would be too low.

 

[imacdog]

Are you?

As I get to vote on our contract and neither you nor Xrated gets to, then yes I am.

 

[gunfyter]

The way to do it is to compare the compensation in Constant 2007 dollars of a pilot in say years 8-15... to a Pilot just hitting year 8 today. The compensation in a new agreement over those years must be adjusted to the same value in constant 2007 dollars.

As of today 8 years of inflation applied to the 2007 pay scales would bring us back to equal with those numbers.

Its about 17.5 % across the board just to get even. But still puts us way short of SWA+1%

I don't think certain people's secretaries should be paying their pilot's on discount airlines MORE than certain billionaire's pay their pilots on private jets... on top of the indignity of the secretary paying higher taxes than the billionaire

 

[T-1GUY]

Is the swa + 1% based on Southwest's current contract numbers? They are negotiating a new raise at this moment.

 

[acaTerry]

With ALL due respect, that is exactly what UAL and Delta pilots said several years ago when they were paid so much both companies almost went kaput.
It is rationalizing exorbitantly high pay.

Not a good comparison. Our company is making money hand over fist...they were not. And the money troubles they were having were NOT related to pilot compensation, but by poor management. They started making more money, everyone got big raises, and guess what...both are doing even better after the raises. Ask any DAL pilot about their most recent bonus check (which BTW is not given on terms of never being sick, never having a broken airplane, bad WX, etc). It can be done, and it has been done, and it has been successful.

 

[acaTerry]

Dbl posted....

 

[acaTerry]

Swa is wildly profitable and has been for 40 years in a row.

...and the pilots are getting the rewards of their effort...why are you opposed to us doing the same?