Greatest Threat?

[FlyDeltasJets]

Without getting into a name-calling battle, anyone who proposes that the wage and benefit packages at the lcc's is not having an effect on the legacy carriers is, in my opinion, ignoring reality.

I'll let the rest of you continue with your pi$$ing fight. Before I go, I want to say that I find it extremely disconcerting how many pilots on this board seem to happily accept the demise of our once great profession. One would swear that this is a management board rather than one for pilots. It makes me very worried about our collective future. The race to the bottom has officially begun. I hope you'll pardon me if I am not fighting to come in first in this contest.

 

[46Driver]

If a person's self worth is measured solely with a $ sign, than Allen Iverson and the rest of the NBA are the most respectable people in America.....

 

[Beantown]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Greatest Threat?

. Beantown, we can talk N. Korea all you want once you have served your country!

Are you some kinda of psychic? How do you know I haven't? -Bean

 

[Jeff G]

Without getting into a name-calling battle, anyone who proposes that the wage and benefit packages at the lcc's is not having an effect on the legacy carriers is, in my opinion, ignoring reality.

I'll let the rest of you continue with your pi$$ing fight. Before I go, I want to say that I find it extremely disconcerting how many pilots on this board seem to happily accept the demise of our once great profession. One would swear that this is a management board rather than one for pilots. It makes me very worried about our collective future. The race to the bottom has officially begun. I hope you'll pardon me if I am not fighting to come in first in this contest.

Whatever. I'm pretty tired of this argument myself. But if you think that LCC's would go away if only nobody would work there, you may be the one with the reality problem. Reality is that there's precious little work to be had at any carrier other than LCC's and regionals. Knowing your stance about the growth of regional carriers, and about the growth of LCC's, I imagine you think that pilots should just collect unemployment rather than pollute their souls working for such unworthy employers.

Form a pilots guild and then your problems are solved. Borrow Doc Brown's De Lorean, go back to 1920 and let me know how it turns out. Short of that, I think this is just wishful thinking on your part. I sure don't have any answers for you.

 

[FlyDeltasJets]

Whatever. I'm pretty tired of this argument myself. But if you think that LCC's would go away if only nobody would work there, you may be the one with the reality problem. Reality is that there's precious little work to be had at any carrier other than LCC's and regionals. Knowing your stance about the growth of regional carriers, and about the growth of LCC's, I imagine you think that pilots should just collect unemployment rather than pollute their souls working for such unworthy employers.

Form a pilots guild and then your problems are solved. Borrow Doc Brown's De Lorean, go back to 1920 and let me know how it turns out. Short of that, I think this is just wishful thinking on your part. I sure don't have any answers for you.

Jeff,

I'm sorry if you found insult in my post. None was intended, and you might notice that I never once blamed any pilot for the current industy condition. I know full well that every pilot is doing the best he can do for his family and his future. However, I have attempted to point out that certain benefit and wage packages are putting undue pressure on existing CBA's. I don't have a solution for this, but I do know that one will never be found unless we admit that a problem exists. And it does exist, for all of us, whether people choose to admit it or not. For as soon as mgts are able to compete by undercutting salaries and benefits, other airlines will have no choice but to follow suit (as we are seeing at virtually every carrier as we speak). The race to the bottom has begun, and no one should think that they are immune from participating simply because they had a head start. It is a cycle, and unless we address it, it will continue, and it will affect every pilot at every airline.

Apparently, that doesn't concern many here, and those who it does concern are labled greedy. It's pretty scary.

 

[chawbein]

There are about a million factors making the industry what it is today. If you have a problem with so many pilots willing to "prostitute themselves out", then why don't you pilots as a group (and a powerefull group at that) put Kit Darby and the rest of these "aviation schools" out of business.

I'm dead serious about regulating the number of pilots. Shut down those P.O.S schools, and make your companies make contracts with just a few VERY REPUTABLE aviation schools, raise the standards to get in, make a degree and qualifying test (like the MCAT) a prerequisite. Then all hiring from whatever regionals will come from said schools, you get dudes (both guys and gals) who are motivated, and have worked very hard (not that they haven't now). Now you have just raised the standards for pilots and lowered the demand.

Oh well, what do I know....

 

[Jeff G]

Jeff,

I'm sorry if you found insult in my post.

None taken at all. I only intended to show the futility of taking a "moral" stance on working for a regional or LCC. You can take the "prostitution" theme too far, and that crosses the line. I'm as frustrated as you are, and as I said, I don't have any answers. I can see the writing on the wall, but don't know what can be done differently. No doubt boy wonders like 737G would just have us quit, and tread water at Home Depot (no wait, I'll just jump into a $125k/yr job until it blows over...) until a truly "worthy" job comes along, but that's not reasonable either.

Besides, all things considered, I really like what I do and the company I work for. I would probably stay even if everyone else was hiring by the bucketloads. That probably makes me weird from your standpoint; it certainly doesn't make me a "prostitute." Will I think differently in ten or twenty years? I don't know. I'll let you know in ten or twenty years. Unfortunately, very few of us are gifted with that kind of foresight, and I'm not one of them.

As far as the "race to the bottom" is concerned, I agree there is currently a lot of downward pressure on wages and working conditions, some of it coming from LCC's, but by no means all. Much of the industry is in survival mode, and emergency surgery is in progress to try to save the patient. But nobody stays in surgery forever (unfortunately some die first), and the dynamics are such that I don't think there will be an accelerating trend downward. There is always upward pressure, but for the moment it's not as critical as survival. When survival is no longer in doubt, then it will reassert itself. This is a deep low, yes, but still part of a cycle. IMHO of course. The details differ every time, but it's still the same pattern.

The trick is timing the cycle. United had lousy timing, and got their raise through methods that utterly alienated their customer base. They're paying for that mistake now. Delta is in much better shape, though it came a year later and was worth more. It's a stronger company, and DALPA didn't cause a summer from hell. In a way, it's a shame that contracts continue in perpetuity until amended under the RLA because in so many cases the timing favors management. After cuts, payback out to be due, but they can string you out for years under cut wages, then claim poverty (after years of record profits!) when they finally get around to negotiating seriously. Naturally, it only makes the pilots look greedy when they want their pay back, especially what times aren't so good anymore. Everyone conveniently forgets past sacrifices. I wonder if the ratcheting down of "real" wages has more to do with this dynamic (long periods of cuts, shorter periods of raises) than anything else. If there was a way to smooth the cycle, or react more quickly to market conditions (with wages somewhat tied to performance instead of locked in for 5-7 years at a time) instead of lagging by several years, that would help a great deal. It would take a lot of trust on all sides to make it work. Just thinking out loud, I could be way off.

 

[mar]

It's an interesting idea

Chawbein makes an interesting point--it might be worth starting a new thread and see how it plays out.

As for the pilot that would *turn down* a $300,000/yr job...well, you're looking at him.

That kind of money is obscene to work 14-21 days out of the month. It's obscene to require that much when you fly the most automated machine in the sky.

Everything has it's price. If you make that kind of money you will pay for it somewhere else.

I remember a discussion on a United flightdeck (I was jumpseating) several years ago after their last big negotiation. The copilot said to the captain, "I wish we would've pushed harder for more work rules and less money."

Ah, I thought. Here's someone who realizes size doesn't matter.

 

[CatYaaak]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Greatest Threat?

My plane only has 12 seats, so what should I be making? $12,000 per year?

Egads! And you have one more engine on your Falcon than I do on my Falcon, so that means I should only be making...uhhhhummm....hold on a sec <furiously hammering numbers into my calculator>....(gulp)..

$8,000 per year!

But wait a second, standby to hold short....if you take my REAL salary and divide it by the number of Falcon seats, and then multiply that $$amount by the seats in a Delta 777 and compare it to a Delta 777 Captain's salary...hmmm <again with the calculater taptaptap>...well, there you have it, plain as day, no doubt about it,.....

..DELTA CAPTAINS..INDEED ALL AIRLINE PILOTS.. ARE LOWERING THE BAR FOR PILOT SALARIES WHEN THEY ACCEPTED A PALTRY 300,000 PER YEAR! They should be making WELL OVER A COOL $3 MILLION PER YEAR!!!!

FlyDeltasJets, what kind of Company Kool-Aid are you guys guzzling over there in the 121 world anyway? Wouldja quit bickering with your brothers and start pulling your weight to preserve the proffesion? We're sick of carrying the entire load.

 

[jstyle13]

Always like this?

As someone who is trying to become an airline pilot and who is also fairly new to the boards...has it always been like this on the forums? Did people b!tch at each other all the time when things were good, or is it just part of the times? I know I don't deal with a lot of the issues you guys are facing with your jobs being that I'm still a lowly CFI and time builder, but I just was hoping that it hasn't always been like this. Seems like any time a new thread is started, it turns into a shouting match between people of different companies. One post mentioned that there is an overabundance of pilots on the market. One way to help stem that is to have them read some of the posts on this forum, might make some of those who aren't as diehard about it choose another profession. The more I read some of these posts, the more depressed I get about a future in aviation, although there's absolutely nothing else I want to do. Thanks.