Avantair pay cut vacay elimination

[jonjuan]

Stock down another 24% today after financials from past years have to be restated. market cap is at $8 Mil. ouch.......

 

[G4dude]

I want to unionize EVERY pilot... period. If it were up to me, we'd have a professional guild and nobody would be able to work without a card... we'd get rid of ALPA, and all the other separate union groups and all fall under one group. Then we'd have true power to set wages, work conditions and safety policies across the board evenly and take the labor portion out of the competitive equation. Much like the trade unions of days gone by.

Unions have on many occasions saved their air carrier from idiotic management.. After all, we usually have a lot more vested in our employment than the revolving door CEO's..

Let's posit this: your national union has been successful in pushing salaries and working conditions to a high level. How would you deal with all the pilots who want a job and are willing to work for less?

 

[G4dude]

I want to unionize EVERY pilot... period. If it were up to me, we'd have a professional guild and nobody would be able to work without a card... we'd get rid of ALPA, and all the other separate union groups and all fall under one group. Then we'd have true power to set wages, work conditions and safety policies across the board evenly and take the labor portion out of the competitive equation. Much like the trade unions of days gone by.

Unions have on many occasions saved their air carrier from idiotic management.. After all, we usually have a lot more vested in our employment than the revolving door CEO's..

And because your union has been successful in driving up pay and benefits, there will be an increase in supply of pilots as more are attracted to the industry, resulting in more unemployed pilots trying to get those higher paying jobs. How will this union fight off this oversupply of pilots caused by the union's successful activities? And then, because the cost of staffing pilots has gone up, companies will gradually decrease the numbers employed as consumers react to the increased cost of air travel by flying less, further increasing the supply of unemployed pilots. Therefore, the union has caused an oversupply of pilots and a decrease of pilot jobs, by creating a non-free market upward coercive force helping pilots make more money. Oops! The Law of Unintended Consequences has struck again!

 

[G4dude]

I want to unionize EVERY pilot... period. If it were up to me, we'd have a professional guild and nobody would be able to work without a card... we'd get rid of ALPA, and all the other separate union groups and all fall under one group. Then we'd have true power to set wages, work conditions and safety policies across the board evenly and take the labor portion out of the competitive equation. Much like the trade unions of days gone by.

Unions have on many occasions saved their air carrier from idiotic management.. After all, we usually have a lot more vested in our employment than the revolving door CEO's..

What I DO like about your National Union idea is it has good intentions, and you obviously thought about it a lot. Kudos for that. I am enjoying this conversation, and you have not called me a lying scumsucking scoundrel and made observations about my urinating habits, for which I commend you!

 

[gunfyter]

G4,

That's how it works ... only if the Union succeeds in driving compensation to a point higher than the value of the Pilot Productivity. Good luck with that... we got a long way to go....

 

[brokeflyer]

how many times will you fly on a plane compared to how many times you'll have open heart surgery.

Flying should be very expensive for sure.

 

[Jack Campbell]

Let's posit this: your national union has been successful in pushing salaries and working conditions to a high level. How would you deal with all the pilots who want a job and are willing to work for less?

G4dude, you have some good ideas about business that I agree with, but on this I disagree. Pilots need unions to provide a balance in the management/labor relationship. If there is not enough balance, the stronger side will abuse the weaker side. Unions provide some balance in that relationship and are therefore required. History has proven this many times and its not just about income. With this comes responsibility that no one side should abuse their position, but I don't want to get into a long conversation about that on the forum.

To answer your question, there will always be pilots who want to work for less. I haven't taken a poll but I would say these are the less qualified (or un-qualified for various reasons) pilots.

Why aren't more people complaining about how high management's salaries are?

 

[gret]

You know, it is very sad and almost brings me to tears hearing off the cuff comments about CEO pay and incompetence on these boards. Does anyone have any facts about how much the CEO of any of the fractional companies make, except for the one mentioned in this thread?

The burdens of being in mgmt are never ending. There isn’t so many days on and so many days off. They take their work home with them 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They have to worry about all the employees and have to spend a lot of time with a small group of ding dongs that are unemployable outside the aviation industry.

If you think you can do a better job, get into mgmt.

Most executives in aviation are drastically underpaid compared to their counterparts in other industries and that is why we can’ attract talent that may make a difference.

For Christ’s sake, a lousy $500K a year is nothing. You can’t even afford a Bentley on this minimum wage.

People should start thanking their lucky stars for having anybody to work in these positions at all. Keep in mind mgmt is selected by the real stakeholders in the company, the shareholders.

 

[Jack Campbell]

.....

 

[imacdog]

The burdens of being in mgmt are never ending. There isn’t so many days on and so many days off. They take their work home with them 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They have to worry about all the employees and have to spend a lot of time with a small group of ding dongs that are unemployable outside the aviation industry.

....and some even have to balance all of that with insider trading deals. It can be rough!

 

[G4dude]

G4dude, you have some good ideas about business that I agree with, but on this I disagree. Pilots need unions to provide a balance in the management/labor relationship. If there is not enough balance, the stronger side will abuse the weaker side. Unions provide some balance in that relationship and are therefore required. History has proven this many times and its not just about income. With this comes responsibility that no one side should abuse their position, but I don't want to get into a long conversation about that on the forum.

To answer your question, there will always be pilots who want to work for less. I haven't taken a poll but I would say these are the less qualified (or un-qualified for various reasons) pilots.

Why aren't more people complaining about how high management's salaries are?

Good post. I am saying that if pay is driven upward, more people will decide to become pilots, creating an oversupply, further bringing down pay unless the National Union can impose its iron will on all pilots and employers. By the way, do you know why regional pilots are so poorly paid? Because they are willing to fly for such a small amount of money. Do you know why? Because of the higher than marketplace pay of senior captains. The younger guys and gals are willing to work for peanuts to get a shot at such big money. The bigger the top money, the more people will chase it, creating an oversupply.

 

[gret]

Yes...and that too!

 

[CE750Driver]

You really must stop drinking and posting. I said I PREFER "at will" employment. I was forced to join the union because I wanted to stay at NetJets, and I am still happy here, but I wish it was like before, an "at will" relationship. NJI was run better, was more profitable, more flexible in rearranging schedules, and more personal in how the company related to the employees.

Hey ass clown. You said you are proud to work at will.

No prefer in there.

You really must spit your boyfriends junk out of you mouth and pay attention when you post.

 

[gret]

Hey ass clown. You said you are proud to work at will.

No prefer in there.

You really must spit your boyfriends junk out of you mouth and pay attention when you post.

and you point was...?

Good robust debate is great...but what does this add to the discussion?

 

[Jack Campbell]

Good post. I am saying that if pay is driven upward, more people will decide to become pilots, creating an oversupply, further bringing down pay unless the National Union can impose its iron will on all pilots and employers. By the way, do you know why regional pilots are so poorly paid? Because they are willing to fly for such a small amount of money. Do you know why? Because of the higher than marketplace pay of senior captains. The younger guys and gals are willing to work for peanuts to get a shot at such big money. The bigger the top money, the more people will chase it, creating an oversupply.

My perspective is that I fly because I really enjoy it. If the money wasn't there, I would do something else. Pilots have a unique skill-set and tremendous responsibilty, and should be compensated for that. But the problem is that some companies take advantage of our love of flying. All I'm saying is that unions have a place in our industry: to keep management relatively honest, to keep management from taking too much. Its not a union's job to take too much,either. We need to have reasonable people on both sides. The oversupply issue comes naturally because the job seems so attractive (yes, partly because of the pay at the airlines and top corporate jobs) and we like to do it.

 

[gunfyter]

Well said, Jack.

 

[G4dude]

My perspective is that I fly because I really enjoy it. If the money wasn't there, I would do something else. Pilots have a unique skill-set and tremendous responsibilty, and should be compensated for that. But the problem is that some companies take advantage of our love of flying. All I'm saying is that unions have a place in our industry: to keep management relatively honest, to keep management from taking too much. Its not a union's job to take too much,either. We need to have reasonable people on both sides. The oversupply issue comes naturally because the job seems so attractive (yes, partly because of the pay at the airlines and top corporate jobs) and we like to do it.

Good post. Here is a question, and I don't know the answer, so it is not a setup for some preordained point: Did the airlines have a pilot seniority before unions came along?

 

[fob727]

Pick up "Flying The Line".

 

[G4dude]

Pick up "Flying The Line".

Ok, thanks.

 

[nordo_2]

My perspective is that I fly because I really enjoy it. If the money wasn't there, I would do something else. Pilots have a unique skill-set and tremendous responsibilty, and should be compensated for that. But the problem is that some companies take advantage of our love of flying. All I'm saying is that unions have a place in our industry: to keep management relatively honest, to keep management from taking too much. Its not a union's job to take too much,either. We need to have reasonable people on both sides. The oversupply issue comes naturally because the job seems so attractive (yes, partly because of the pay at the airlines and top corporate jobs) and we like to do it.

The problem with aviation is, it’s filled with managers. Not leaders. There are very few Herb K.s in this business. NetJets has a perfect example of that with the current CEO, J.H.. He is there to care take, and manage. He is no leader. Unlike most of the pilots, he will not finish his career at NetJets. He has no vested interest in the long term of this company.