Everything is Coming Together for Delta

[titans10]

I only look at it differently because I didn't take the job as a new-hire F/O, but rather as an off-the-street CA with Pay and Hotel and Per Diem while in training. Wouldn't have taken it otherwise.

I also didn't get hired during the holidays, have no clue about the furloughs you're talking about. When I got hired, every Major was hiring, my company was shutting down and putting me out of a job, and while I had interviews lined up at UAL and was working with PR to get a DAL interview, I had to have something to hold me over.

Then 9/11 happened.

Not sure what you're getting at but if you're talking about working at the Regionals as an overall problem, then yes, I guess I'm guilty. Just wouldn't do it for the slave labor wages they pay new-hires.

I was talking about the furloughed mainline pilots that happened around the holidays in 01. Yes you were part of the problem working at the regionals.

 

[Dumb Pilot]

I was talking about the furloughed mainline pilots that happened around the holidays in 01. Yes you were part of the problem working at the regionals.

Just a minute there buddy! The pilot group at PCL fought very hard to get those pilots jobs at PCL, it wasn't the pilots working at the regionals that voted outsourcing by margins of over 60%, it was mainline pilots. There were over 200 NWA guys worked at PCL until they started recalling or simply moved to other gigs (some went to FDX/UPS) besides the point that PCL also furloughed in 01, although for a short period because guess what? The mainline pilot group voted to increase the outsourcing and that is when PCL started getting 2 to 3 airplanes a month, I was a line trainer then and for a good couple of years I did nothing but train NWA guys.

 

[titans10]

Ok buddy. I am just tired of all this anger against mainline pilots for trying to take back flying from contract carriers. I don't remember anyone having sympathy for mainline furloughed pilots that had no vote on outsourcing flying. I could have went to PNcL. I did not want to help lower the bar as you did. Never worked for one never will.

 

[Dumb Pilot]

The bar was lowered by the ones that voted for the outsourcing, not the ones that for one reason or another, sometimes had no choice but to take those crappy jobs created by mainline senior pilots securing their conditions at the expense of eating their young. We are all guilty of not standing strong enough against what continues to happen in this industry, all that nonesense about taking flying back when DAL just ordered a whole bunch of RJ's and beating your chest with that self pedestal that you used to climb on that big horse of yours, and it is nothing but a Trojan horse filled with terms and conditions that are two decades behind where they should be, you are making a LOT less than what your counterparts are making in other first world countries, by accepting those terms, that ridiculous first year pay, accepting a job at a company that decimated the pilots retirements, you are also bearing your fair share of the degradation of this career buddy! We all have our crosses to bare, get over yourself

 

[titans10]

I am over myself. You took a job out of seniority order as a street captain. how did that help the regionals. Whatever helps you justify yourself.

 

[Bringupthebird]

The days of pilots of the industry standing together to raise the bar is gone.

When was that!!?? I don't know how long you've been in the industry, but the bellwether contracts occurred during times of full-throttle expansion by airline clamoring for market share. That hasn't happened in 30 years or so.

Pilots didn't stand up for one another. The cockpits of New York Air and Continental and some Eastern were filled by opportunistic skbs when times turned bad. Sure some were helped out, but many folks when hearing of another pilot's plight just said, "That's a shame, but on a lighter note, I'm upgrading!"

 

[Lear70]

Ok buddy. I am just tired of all this anger against mainline pilots for trying to take back flying from contract carriers. I don't remember anyone having sympathy for mainline furloughed pilots that had no vote on outsourcing flying. I could have went to PNcL. I did not want to help lower the bar as you did. Never worked for one never will.

Everybody has their opinion about it, and you're certainly entitled to yours.

My company had its flying taken by FedEx and they permanently furloughed and shut down, a street CA position at PCL was the best I could find on short notice, then 9/11 screwed us all.

This goes back to Scope EVER being given away. If it hadn't, none of this would be a problem. Additionally, you seem to think I'm arguing that mainline taking back Scope is a bad thing... I'm certainly not saying that, Scope take-back is a good thing, but that's a small percentage of the shutdown of PCL if it happens.

The problem is deliberately shutting down one company because their costs are too high then simply farming the portions of THAT flying that they like to a newer, lower-cost airline. The outsourced flying IS STILL THERE, they're just screwing over people to make it cost mainline less to farm it out.

THAT'S what I'm upset about. Hope that makes sense.

 

[Freight Dog]

The problem is deliberately shutting down one company because their costs are too high then simply farming the portions of THAT flying that they like to a newer, lower-cost airline. The outsourced flying IS STILL THERE, they're just screwing over people to make it cost mainline less to farm it out.

THAT'S what I'm upset about. Hope that makes sense.

The MBA's and bean counters wouldn't be doing their jobs if they weren't exploiting this to squeeze every last dime for the shareholders. Not personal, it's their job, and they're doing it right.

When ALPA and the collective pilot mentality moves to the 21st century, maybe things will improve... but until then... it's just sad to watch.

 

[Lear70]

The MBA's and bean counters wouldn't be doing their jobs if they weren't exploiting this to squeeze every last dime for the shareholders. Not personal, it's their job, and they're doing it right.

That kind of mentality is a large indicator of what is wrong with Corporate America and why the middle class will continue to get squeezed until there's nothing left of this Country but MBA's and bean counters at the top and entitlement people at the bottom.

That approach simply isn't sustainable in the long term. Make take a few more decades for people to figure out, but you can see it clearly from where people's standard of living was 30 years ago and where it is now in the U.S.

When ALPA and the collective pilot mentality moves to the 21st century, maybe things will improve... but until then... it's just sad to watch.

What did you have in mind?

 

[Flyer1015]

Dumb Pilot is precisely correct.

While SOME flying is shifting back to Mainline, by dumping Comair and, if it goes down like that, PCL as well, while shifting the new CRJ-9 deliveries to the lowest bidder, they are artificially LOWERING the bar for the Regionals that people worked VERY hard to raise, while simultaneously hurting a LOT of careers.

That's never a good thing.

They are just lowering it to what a regional was suppose to be in the first place: cheap contract feed. With current Airbus pilots at US Air making 125/hr and up until recently United guys making 137/hr, do you really think it's reasonable to have a 18yr CRJ payrate of 107/hr? Pinnacle outpriced itself out of the regional model. They took the industry standard 12-year pay rung/ladder and raised it to 18. All to benefit the top guys. And the latest rumor is that the new TA limits the FOs to 4 year max at about 35/hr. It doesn't take a genius to figure out who's running the show at 9E and at what seniority level the strings are being pulled.

As another guy posted, I think it's just business. Not a wellfare.