APA proposes pay scale for AE

[surplus1]

As far as ALPA goes, there is significant support among some APA members to explore reaffliliating with ALPA, but most feel the timing is not right . . . right now. In a few years, I think it could be a real possibility. Personally, I'm not in favor of it, but I wouldn't fight it if a majority of my union brothers wanted it.

Dragin,

No, I wasn't talking about the AE stuff at all. I was talking about your potential reaffiliation with ALPA.

I remember you told me you were opposed. I also know that the year that ALPA had to get enough cards to call a vote has expired and they didn't make it.

So, they have changed strategy. Now they are going at it from the merger angle instead of the traditional NMB procedure. It is much easier to get a political group at APA to drum a meger between ALPA/APA than it is to get individual cards. If your Board approves it (political again) you will soon be back in the ALPA fold.

Then you can happily return to fighting with UAL and DAL over who runs the show. Isn't that why you all left in the first place?

Good strategy for ALPA. Back door coup de etats work good in unions too. See ya at the country club.

BTW, are you at liberty to post the rates that APA proposed for AE aircraft in your opener?

 

[Draginass]

That's a real reach. Last union meeting I was in, the back doors were well guarded. Wishful thinking on some people's part.

Any company integration of AE into AAL would almost certainly have the APA as the bargaining agent, not ALPA. In addition, I'm almost certain that anything other than a staple would be totally unacceptable to the APA membership. Switching to ALPA could introduce some loss of control over the integration protocol. That in itself would kill any thoughts ALPA reaffiliation for the forseeable future. This, of course, is an academic discussion anyway, 'cause with AMR, it's got about a snowball's chance in h*ll of happening.

As far as pay rates for small jets go, I don't know where that's coming from. I've certainly not seen anything published anywhere on that, although I think that you can bet that scope still resides at it's rightful and usual place on the priority list.

 

[macdaddy]

Draginass:

I'm not delusional. By career, I'm a professional negotiator - I'm an attorney who took a stab at changing careers because I love to fly airplanes. Before 9/11 happened I thought it was a good time to try changing careers. The only thing that kept me out of the Air Force was my eyesight. I went to a big name law school and also have an undergraduate biz ad degree. None of those AMR managers are better educated than I am.

It IS STUPID to ask for the moon when the economic climate is undeniably poor. You (APA) lose credibility by asking for ridiculous things. Do I need to give examples of the proposal and embarass APA on this board? Do you want me to remind you how stupid you guys were in dealing with Judge Kendall? You guys cash the big paychecks and lose touch with reality, economic and otherwise.



Your attitude and conclusions are misplaced. I never suggested that you should agree to lower wide-body pay. You guys are in fact overpaid for the job you perform. You have managed to extort too much money from the big airlines and are in fact killing the goose that laid the golden egg. It will be a long time before the majors hire any new people. They will continue to lose business to Southwest, Frontier, Jetblue, Regional carriers, and fractional operators.

AMR managers are programmed to say "no" to any employee suggestions for improvement. That is not a good modern management practice. Good managers listen to the people they manage.

What I am suggesting that you say is too cryptic for you to understand is that it makes some sense to have "one list" at AMR, Delta, United and NW. By having all the jet flying done by the same airline would eliminate duplicate layers of managment. It would allow more flexibility in equipment changes for load changes. Dragin- have you noticed that Wall Street likes mergers, likes it when corporations get rid of extra management? Do you need me to draw a picture????

Merging to one list isn't likely to happen because the pilots at the Regional (Comair excluded, they showed they have stones) have allowed themselves to be hung out to dry - with ALPA paying out the rope. ALPA has screwed over the regional pilots and is hurting the profession as a whole by not doing more to remedy the situation. I'm old enough to remember when Lorenzo was around and ALPA did everything they could to fight B scales. Regionals are C minus pay scales and ALPA ain't doin squat to fight it.


I'll come back to this later, when I've got more time.

 

[Draginass]

Thanks for the best laugh I've had all week!

A lawyer calling an airline pilot overpaid? That's rich.

 

[macdaddy]

Is that the best you can do? How about a reply on the merits?

If they read this, I'll bet Skydiverdriver and the other RJDC guys are laughing their you-know-what-off that Draginass is stumped.

I'm not overpaid. I earn what I make. If I'm lazy, I make less. If I work hard and am productive, I make more.

 

[Caveman]

Macdaddy posted:

"You guys are in fact overpaid for the job you perform. You have managed to extort too much money from the big airlines and are in fact killing the goose that laid the golden egg. It will be a long time before the majors hire any new people. They will continue to lose business to Southwest, Frontier, Jetblue, Regional carriers, and fractional operators."

100% correct and the pilots at the majors are 100% in denial. They still think that they can somehow keep drawing water out of an empty well. Look at the numbers. UAL lost something like $500 million dollars last quarter. DAL $400 million. The 'success' of the industry earned $21 million (LUV). To you and I $21 million is a ton of money but to a multibillion dollar company $21 mil is chump change and a dismal showing no matter how they try to spin it.

 

[Draginass]

Sorry, I had to stop laughing before I could write a reply. I thought at first you were a real lawyer because only a real lawyer would have the huzpuh to be critical of another profession's compensation, but now I'm not so sure. Most of the lawyers I know wouldn't be as defensive about their compensation. So, I'm not so sure now.

My compensation is determined between the union and management based upon a mutually agreed upon rate. How do you feel about management's opener last August? Pretty good money there with a promise of industry leading. My compensation is a relatively fixed cost just like fuel, just like gate rent, just like aircraft leases, etc. The company has the power of furlough to cut down on labor costs during times of extended low demand. If the company wants to renegotiate compensation, they can ask, just like they do with the oil company, aircraft lessor, etc. And point of fact, UAL and DAL managements may. UAL's management buffoonery during their pilot's contract is well documented. Well, right now, my compensation is a full 30% below current industry standard and I'm betting the rest of my miserable overcompensated ($80K per year) underworked (19 days a month away from home and based in a very high cost area) career that I'll get some compensation increase on this next contract. And, guess what, I think I'm worth it. If the company won't agree to it, let them. Labor law will take it's course.

My compensation is a cost, just like what the company pays the CEO, company officers, and bevy of corporate lawyers.

Caveman, the major airline pilot neverbe, I think feels this need to slam major pilots at every opportunity in hopes of lowering them to his compensation level. Ok fine, but it's not keeping me awake at night.

I agree that as far as combining AE and AA goes, it makes sense from a standpoint of management simplicity/efficiency, but right now is an impractical idea. Management has no incentive, even if the major lowered compensation. Management knows that they would experience immediate upward pressure, only this time there's no one to whipsaw. Probably the only way they'd go for it would be with a AE style no-strike contract, in which case labor would have little leverage - just like AE got emasculated in 1997.

In retrospect, my personal opinion is that errors were made by the major unions in not countering the regional concept earlier and being preoccupied with immediate self interest. Gosh, imagine that - self interest. But, that said, I'm not sure it would have made much difference anyway. If I were management I wouldn't give up the commuter scope loophole unless I could neuter the major's contract. So, here we are 15 years later with the major with decent compensation and some protective scope provisions, and a regional with lousy compensation and having to fight tooth and nail against outsourcing of their jobs to subcontrators.

The future I see is the ATA's assault on unionism in general, and specifically to put the politicians (lawyers) deeper in their pockets to change the RLA provisions. This would put the companies evern more clearly in a position of superiority.

Were do we go from here? The APA's made the first step with respect to fixing the regional problem. They have only a bit of leverage, while AE has zero. Even so, AMR won't go for it unless they can emasculate APA's contract with industry trailing compensation and a no-strike provision for a very long time.

Something else to consider. I wonder how the face of hiring would change assuming no precipitous drop in compensation. I wonder if minimally qualified pilots who used to get hired by major's regionals would be bypassed in larger numbers in favor of experienced pilots (assuming everybody absorbed their regionals.

Go ahead and hate us all you want. The terrorist assault effects will wear down and the economy is going to pick up again, and things will be fine for the majors. Scare tactics and a few Chicken Little's or not.

 

[FlyingSig]

I'm not delusional. By career, I'm a professional negotiator - I'm an attorney who took a stab at changing careers because I love to fly airplanes. Before 9/11 happened I thought it was a good time to try changing careers. The only thing that kept me out of the Air Force was my eyesight. I went to a big name law school and also have an undergraduate biz ad degree. None of those AMR managers are better educated than I am.

I gotta say thank you... I haven't laughed like that reading this board in quite some time.

I'm not quite sure what your plan is. You say major airline pilots are greedy sob's. Fine, so you want to work for a regional, but by throwing in how smart and edjumakated your are, I'd say you probally don't wan't to be a pilot, you'd rather be a "managment pilot". That's ok too, to each their own. But then you try to warm up to the RJDC crowd when in all reality you want to be on the other side of the table negotiating for the company while you tell your other lawyer friends that you're a pilot. (That's the delusional part)

So what's with the eyesight excuse? So you couldn't get into the airforce. So what? Not motivated enough to go through the civilian ranks. Oh, the money thing right...... you had to get edjumaketed to get the money to pay for the flying. OK, I'm with ya.

I digress.... (If I were a RJDC type though, I'd run as far away from this ambulance chaser.... let's see, I think the last CoEx NMB mediator who used to be an Eagle pilot (lawyer type) suddenly became a negotiator for ExpressJet...funny how that works out)


FYI though, DAL's super expensive rates.... turns out that if you take the pilot rates in 1985 and add inflation to them, the new expensive rates are still lagging by about 10% .... but since you're a professional negotiator you know that pilot productivity is not so much in the payrates but the workrules which are negotiated as well as limited by FAR's.

Nice to see someone who doesn't work for an airline and has never worked for an airline be such an expert on airlines. You probally subscribe to Holly Hennigan's gossip column. You're not related to Terry Erskine are you?

 

[Caveman]

I have to admit it's getting tougher and tougher to bite my tongue and not respond in kind to juvenile comments from the likes of Draginass. FWIW, I don't have an ax to grind with major airline pilots. In fact if the cards fall right I might even consider applying to one or two of them in a few years.

Let me rephrase an earlier comment I made. SOME major airline pilots mistakenly believe that the industry will continue to operate as it has for the past 30 years or so. In my opinion I don't think it will. The small jet is changing the way business is done in drastic ways. Of particular importance is that it's changing the way pilots approach their careers and their expectations.

As recently as 10 years ago the idea of spending an entire career at what were then correctly labled commuter airlines was considered to be idiotic. These carriers were typically stepping stones to bigger, faster equipment and better paying jobs with the potential for a decent living and a decent retirement. The commuters offered none of this.

Along comes the small jet and things start to change in a big way. Slowly at first, but once their viability was proven their use and growth snowballed at an incredible rate. So did the carriers that employed them. What were once exclusively t-prop operators flying 250nm legs to a hub are now jet nationals flying point to point 1000nm legs. In some cases the change from caterpillar to butterfly was less than 5 years. That is extraordinary growth in anybody's book.

The big problem is that until very recently compensation and work rules at these jet nationals hasn't kept pace with growth. However, even the modest gains in compensation at these smaller carriers has made them more attractive as a career choice for a growing segment of the pilot community, me included. The pay, work rules and retirement opportunities are attractive enough to make them a legitimate choice. I will not attempt to insult anyone's intelligence and suggest they are on par with one of the big 5 airlines. Not even close. But they are reasonable.

The compensation at these airlines is also the biggest problem facing the industry today. It's the main source of the increasingly rancorous relationship between the various pilot groups. When small jet pilots are willing to fly for significantly less overall compensation than their mainline counterparts the companies outsource more and more flying to the small jet guys. This threatens mainline pilot job security and causes stagnant growth in their compensation. No wonder they are pissed. Conversly, the mainline pilots try to protect what has traditionally been their piece of the pie and it's done at the expense of small jet opportunities. Thus, the small jet guys are pissed.

How do we fix it? The primary solution is that I have to become as concerned about mainline job security and compensation as they are about mine. I have to get on the same page as Draginass and FlyingSig and they have to be on the same page as me. The hard part is that it's probably going to be a different page than either of us are on now. Collectively we have to come to some sort of agreement on where we are and where we want to go as the labor part of this industry. When we are once again one voice we regain the power to coerce management in the direction we want to go. Until then management is winning. Divide and conquer is alive and well.

Now the hard part. How do we come to some sort of consensus between mainline and small jet pilots? Frankly, I don't know because both parties are going to have to yield in some way. Pilot egos being what they are and our concern for our livlihoods being paramount seems to stack the deck against us. Unfortunately we have no choice.

The only thing that seems to make sense, at least initially, is the creation of one seniority list whether it be nationally or just between mainline and their WOs. I have no illusions about this being the panacea for our problems nor do I believe it isn't without implementation problems of it's own. Hell, I don't even know if we can get management to go along with it. But it is a step towards some sense of unity which I hope will foster some sense of community for the entire group.

Ideally in the future a pilot will enter the airline ranks at the small jet level and be able to move seamlessly through the ranks to wide body captain all at the same company. Seniority will be preserved and retirement compensation will grow as a result of the increased longevity from staying at one company instead of bouncing around from one employer to another as we progress through our careers.

None of this will happen unless small jet pilots recognize how we threaten mainline and mainline pilots must recognize that we are here to stay. Mutual respect and compromise must be found.

 

[Draginass]

Fasten you seatbelt, Caveman.

My compliments on your realistic, concise and coherent synopsis of the problem. Even Surplus has admitted that his secret plan isn't pratical.

Given currently foreseeable circumstances, what do you think that majors unions will have to give up to entice/compel the corporations to combine their majors and regionals? What will regional pilots have to give up, or do they have any chips to play at all?

In the meantime, I expect things will continue in the status quo with each group rightfully looking out for it's self interest. Majors aren't going to surrender scope (and jobs) to its regional, and expecially not to just watch it leak out of the regional's sieve of a scope clause into company-of-convenience outsourcers. With globalism, the companies would like no restrictions on code shares or scope limitations, thus being able to source the cheapest labor available.

The wild-card in are the politicians like McCain. If he had his way, the industry power balance would be tilted decisively in favor of the corporations and labor would have the right to strike taken away. These guys could care less if an 777 Captain is paid 60k a year and works 16 hours a day, 22 days a month. They just want cheap ticket prices, and no service interuptions.

 

[Ted Striker]

SUPPORT THE PAC!!

Dragin and others...,

You are quite correct about McCain and others like Ole Trent there from Mississippi. I have nothing but respect for John McCain and what he did for this country, but I have to STRONGLY disagree with him on this. Everyone who is an ALPA member needs to support the PAC. This is our only real hedge against the powerful airline lobby, which has been successful in the past at keeping our duty times high. I just browsed through this thread, but I love the lawyer who knows so much about being an airline pilot. The ones who are overpaid are the no-load managers and CEOs who get fat checks every year and nice golden parachutes. The only ones they are making happy are the stockholders who look at nothing but the bottom line. I can't think of a major airline who hasn't completely pissed off at least one of the following: the business traveler, a labor group, the leisure traveler, etc, etc. OK, I am off on a rant... bottom line, support the PAC!!

 

[bayoubandit]

Didn't McCain say that we pilots shouldn't take vacations in the summer since the demand is so much higher. That we should do our part to help the airlines. I believe he even went on to say that us vacationing in the summer was unpatriotic since it disrupted air service to px's by shortening summer staffing levels.

 

[Airline Pilot27]

This is hearsay but what is ironic is that McCain has a son that flies for a mAAjor airline. That being the case and himself being a former distinguished Navy Pilot one would think he would be a little more sympathetic to airline pilots. Not all of us are making the big bucks...especially at Eagle.

 

[surplus1]

That's a real reach. Last union meeting I was in, the back doors were well guarded. Wishful thinking on some people's part.

Well, I got it from the horses mouth, i.e., AA pilots. According to what I read, posted by an AA pilot, there's an active movement among AA pilots, complete with petitions and proposed resolutions, to get your Board to take up and agree to a merger between APA and ALPA. It even includes quotes from the ALPA president. Are you sure you're up to date with what's going on in your own union? If you're not in favor of such a merger you'd best find out.

As far as pay rates for small jets go, I don't know where that's coming from. I've certainly not seen anything published anywhere on that, although I think that you can bet that scope still resides at it's rightful and usual place on the priority list.

Well that's what started this thread. It even includes links (that I can't seem to make work).

I've been trying to get info on where it is. The links take me to ALPA website, but when I sign on, I can't find it anywhere.

It it is true, I find it extremely interesting that the APA, which does not yet represent Eagle pilots, would propose pay rates for Eagle aircraft in its contract opener.

To me, that would confirm completely what I originally said with respect to the APA proposal to "integrate" AE. It is a proposal designed, not to integrate AE pilots, but to transfer AE aircraft to the AA seniority list, without AE pilots.

That takes a lot of cojones.

 

[surplus1]

Fasten you seatbelt, Caveman.

My compliments on your realistic, concise and coherent synopsis of the problem. Even Surplus has admitted that his secret plan isn't pratical.

With all due respect, that's pretty misleading. What I admitted was that even if we overcome the economic difficulties associated with integration of mainline/regional, the corporation would resist because it wants to maintain the leverage provide by 2 or more pilot groups on the same property. That's quite different from what you imply.

I said that my "secret plan" would handle the economic side of the equation, but not the bargaining leverage that the Company now has in its favor.

Stretch it if you want to but stay close to what I said and why I said it.