destruction of unions

[pilotyip]

The CEO compensation bit is just a red herring. You are basically saying that until the private sector changes, you are okay with the public unions raping and plundering the municipal treasuries.

(old post but fits) I saw an article in ATW in 2001 that stated at DAL there were 17 members of top management made more than the top DAL Captain. The combined top 17 salaries equaled less than 1/6 of 1% of the combined pilot salaries. If management worked for free all pilots in the company would get a 1/10 of 1% raise. (for a $100K per year pilot that would be $3/wk increase in take home) Boy that raise would really make the pilot group happy.

Agreed that is called leadership, which is missing in most cases. But the 20%CEO pay cut by it self would mean nothing in saving the company, but it was well received by those also making a sacrifice.

More executive cokk sucking for yip. Very predictable.

ha ha very funny, sounds like jealousy, but then again this is FI were calling is the sign of superiority.

 

[Downwind]

Close, but not quite.

Unions are for workers who might be perceived by management to be unskilled drones. Don't forget how replaceable management thinks you are as a pilot.

You might be the best airline pilot in the world, but good luck getting management to actually act on that, even if they agreed. They will make a decision based on the dollars 99% of the time.

Your sentiment is valid, but it would probably be disastrous to de-unionize.

But doesn't the union prove your point? They know we can't and rarely leave because of our seniority system. If you could walk with two weeks notice taking your type and currency with you would they be so quick to tell you to go pound sand?

 

[Smarta$$]

But doesn't the union prove your point? They know we can't and rarely leave because of our seniority system. If you could walk with two weeks notice taking your type and currency with you would they be so quick to tell you to go pound sand?

Well, who says the next airline has to hire you? If they have 2 applicants for one job, one with a high seniority number and high salary requirement, and someone that is new to the 121 world, with the minimum requirements, but would accept 1/3 of the pay?

They don't HAVE to hire you just because you quit airline ABC with seniority...

Its a bad idea. We are labor, nothing more. Sorry to burst your bubble, you're not management or executive level. You are part number 3432345. Nothing more.

 

[igneousy2]

But doesn't the union prove your point? They know we can't and rarely leave because of our seniority system. If you could walk with two weeks notice taking your type and currency with you would they be so quick to tell you to go pound sand?

That won't work in our occupation because we have no way to back up what we're worth. We would always be in competition with some young kid with shiny new jet syndrome. We have not convinced the customers that our experience matters. If anything we have done more to convince them that it doesn't. And if the customers aren't convinced that it matters...then no management will ever pay for it.

Pilots as a group has gotten on managements side in saying things like "flying is safe", "total time doesn't matter", "if they passed the training and check-rides then all must be okay"...so if all of these things are true, how do we measure what we're worth. I don't have any violations or accidents?...okay, but so do you and 99% of the pilots out there.

Just look on FI on all the posts concerning qualification...for every measure of our qualification you have a large number of pilots that don't think it matters...total time, doesn't matter...military/civilian, doesn't matter...4 year degree no 4 year degree...doesn't matter...we fly wide-bodies-doesn't matter...we fly jets-doesn't matter...we fly approaches to CAT I minimus in some crazy terrain in some insane weather-doesn't matter you are just following the magenta line.

A salesman has his sales figures, a manager has some program he ran that generated X-revenue or saved X-dollars, a riveter can do so many rivets an hour, a welder can weld so many feet an hour,

So for a pilot if not seniority...then what?

 

[livin'thesim]

But doesn't the union prove your point? They know we can't and rarely leave because of our seniority system. If you could walk with two weeks notice taking your type and currency with you would they be so quick to tell you to go pound sand?

Sort of.

The problem is steeply-scaled longevity pay more than it is seniority.

Many pilots would change airlines and accept being junior again as long as they could make a livable wage that is not an insult to their professionalism.

There is no logical reason (other than tradition) for wage scales to skew so steeply with longevity. Steep pay scale increases started so that the senior could be subsidized by the junior. Just a land grab, really.

The union is both curse and blessing, for sure.

 

[SIG600]

Enjoy paying $6500 annually for property taxes for a modest home? move to WI. Public unions are way out of line with the private sector, its disgusting. Go Walker, get er done

This. Once I educated myself on just what a WI citizen is paying in taxes, I was shocked. Look up what a single family making $100K/year living in a $250K house is paying a year in just state and property taxes. It's staggering. I'd be pretty miffed too.

 

[Smarta$$]

Public employees, even those without a union usually get pensions. My father in law is a city employee, no union, gets a pension.

How about Scott Walker? Does he get a pension? How about all those Republican politicians? Are they getting a tax payer funded pension? Are they refusing them and paying back the tax payer? I think I know the answer, and it is pure hypocrisy.

But, they have you all looking at the public union carrot, and get you to ignore all of the problems they have caused (or just keep you from knowing about them through the controlled message of right wing media).

I was flipping back and fourth yesterday between MSNBC and Fox (you know, getting a wider range of information) and observed something I have seen before. Romney and Obama had dueling speaches about 15 minutes apart (no overlap).

Fox and MSNBC played all of Romney's speach, but wouldn't you know, Fox only played a few minutes of Obama's speach. That's "balance" for ya.

 

[Downwind]

Fox and MSNBC played all of Romney's speach, but wouldn't you know, Fox only played a few minutes of Obama's speach. That's "balance" for ya.

That's because a few minutes is all normal people can take of that narcissistic grape ape banging coke head.

 

[Smarta$$]

Wow. Just Wow.

 

[N311HK]

Public employees, even those without a union usually get pensions. My father in law is a city employee, no union, gets a pension.

How about Scott Walker? Does he get a pension? How about all those Republican politicians? Are they getting a tax payer funded pension? Are they refusing them and paying back the tax payer? I think I know the answer, and it is pure hypocrisy.

But, they have you all looking at the public union carrot, and get you to ignore all of the problems they have caused (or just keep you from knowing about them through the controlled message of right wing media).

I was flipping back and fourth yesterday between MSNBC and Fox (you know, getting a wider range of information) and observed something I have seen before. Romney and Obama had dueling speaches about 15 minutes apart (no overlap).

Fox and MSNBC played all of Romney's speach, but wouldn't you know, Fox only played a few minutes of Obama's speach. That's "balance" for ya.

Agree,

Left or Right, we as middle class have been reduced to looking at our peers and saying "We don't have pensions, why should those who I pay taxes for have them?" But what we should be asking why we don't all have pensions. The cycle will not be complete until the rich have all the money. I understand the frustration of paying taxes and seeing them wasted.

 

[Downwind]

Agree,

Left or Right, we as middle class have been reduced to looking at our peers and saying "We don't have pensions, why should those who I pay taxes for have them?" But what we should be asking why we don't all have pensions. The cycle will not be complete until the rich have all the money. I understand the frustration of paying taxes and seeing them wasted.

Well said comrade!

 

[livin'thesim]

Argue all you like, the change is coming, and the taxpayer is declaring his independence from the greed and bullying of PUBLIC unions.

 

[Smarta$$]

Argue all you like, the change is coming, and the taxpayer is declaring his independence from the greed and bullying of PUBLIC unions.

But giving Republican politicians including Scott Walker a tax funded pension is just fine....

 

[dragontamer]

Agree,

But what we should be asking why we don't all have pensions.

Because it is unsustainable. We are living longer. You cannot pay people large amounts of money to sit around and produce nothing for decades. Folks need to plan their own retirement through investments & 401K's rather than extorting more and more money out of taxpayers--many who are robbing their own retirement accounts to pay the taxes so government workers can have a cushy check of the month.

 

[SIG600]

Because it is unsustainable. We are living longer. You cannot pay people large amounts of money to sit around and produce nothing for decades. Folks need to plan their own retirement through investments & 401K's rather than extorting more and more money out of taxpayers--many who are robbing their own retirement accounts to pay the taxes so government workers can have a cushy check of the month.

Pensions are a ponzi scheme.

The last thing that anyone whose been paying attention the last 12 years should want, is a pension. Why, when you retire, do you still want to be tied to your employers success or failure? Retirement should be freedom, if you didn't plan for it on your own and expect to be taken care of, you have no one to blame but yourself.

 

[igneousy2]

Pensions are a ponzi scheme.

The last thing that anyone whose been paying attention the last 12 years should want, is a pension. Why, when you retire, do you still want to be tied to your employers success or failure? Retirement should be freedom, if you didn't plan for it on your own and expect to be taken care of, you have no one to blame but yourself.

I am probably one of the more hard core Liberterians you could ever talk to, and I agree with your final conclusion that we should all look to ourselves to take care of our retirements, however, the statement that Pensions are ponzi schemes is just plain wrong.

The reason these pensions aren't working is because they are not being adequately funded. Companies/municipalities are allowed to make unreasonable assumptions about the returns on investment that they will make. Look at the other thread concerning Delta's...I think 8% assumption...please. A reasonable assumption in today's market for a pension is probably in the neighborhood of 3%.

Companies/municipalities do not want to make the payments that are required...if companies/municipalties were made to put aside an appopiate amount of monies, pensions would be doing just fine.

What has really compounded the problem for pensions is this ultra-low interest rate environment. Pensions count on making more money in their investments then they pay out, when you are lucky to get 2-3% in safe investments appropriate for pension funds in a 2-3% inflation world you cannot make any money. This is a problem whether you are an individual investor or a pension fund and making individuals save for their own retirement merely pushes the problem onto someone else.

 

[SIG600]

Long list of valid points.

One of the of the fundamental problems though is also the fact that you need to assume the work force at a minimum maintains the status quo. If your work force continues to downsize due to efficiencies or cutbacks, then you start going the wrong way with contributions. Then your 8% growth becomes even more important, you need 10 or 12% just to keep up. As a side note pensions shouldn't be in a companies asset column to begin with, that money isn't theirs.

It's just like social security. 30 years ago we had 16 workers for every 1 person drawing SS. Now it's 4, and quickly declining.

Again, the only person in this world that's going to look out for you, is you, I think we already agree on that. Personally I'd much rather have a DC plan than a DB plan. The day I retire I can shake hands with everyone, say thanks, and hit the links never needing to worry if they're still going to be afloat in 10 years.

 

[pilotyip]

They had to assume the higher rate of return because if they did not they would have to raise taxes around 50% to keep up with pension funding. Unless it was an ultra rich community, you have the problem of people moving away from higher taxes, thereby depressing the property values, which results in lower tax income because it is based on property value. There is only so much the tax paying public will bear to allow public workers to retire at XX years with xx% of their pay. Bck to Walker, 67% of the people voting for him identified themselves as Blue Collar. BTW The city of Detroit is a classic example of this.

 

[flythere]

That's because a few minutes is all normal people can take of that narcissistic grape ape banging coke head.

Amen brother!!!!

 

[densoo]

Public or private, unions are under attack. The court ruled not just on the issue in front of them, but unnecessarily went beyond the issue to further restrict the ability to organize. There will be no sympathy in our current system as we go down the path to a job action. Unity will be paramount. 100% participation and 100% "yes" votes to authorize a strike.

NYT, June 23.

"The Supreme Court’s ruling this week in Knox v. Service Employees International Union is one of the most brazen of the Roberts court. It shows how defiantly the five justices act in advancing the aggressive conservatism of their majority on the court.

The court’s moderate liberals were rightly dismayed by the majority’s willingness to breach court rules in pursuit of its agenda. In this labor union case, there is no getting around that the legal approach is indistinguishable from politics."

http://nyti.ms/MD9icX