Did you hit the high points? No. Unfortunately you missed the point entirely.
Something most of you know, but seem to have forgotten is that corporations exist for one purpose and one purpose only. To make a profit. So of course they are going to try and get you to do as much work as possible for as little pay is possible. That's both understandable and expected. And that's perfectly fine because they need us. In fact they cannot exist without us. The Kenn Ricci's of the world know this. They also know that if they push too far they risk damaging the company and losing their own jobs. Because what happens is, intelligent people say "things aren't as good as they used to be here a company A, I'm going over to company B where they pay better and treat their workers better". At least that's how its supposed to work. Sadly, people like my attacker get lazy. They start uttering phrases like "I don't want to interview again, I don't want to move to a new city, I've been here for XX years", etc., etc. So they start looking for ways to force their employer to pay them more and give them better QOL.
If you wanted stability you should have taken a desk job!
Because I know my value is precisely why I am not worried. If KR turns Flex into a bad place to work I will leave. And yes, if a union is voted in I will leave. As I said before, I will not work in the adversarial atmosphere that unions create.
Hope that helps explain my view.
Biker, all I hear from you is a company apologist. Corporations exist to make a profit? Thanks for the update captain obvious. But I agree to the truth of that statement. What you fail to include, is that the employees of corporations go to work to make money for themselves and their families, and to be able to have a life outside of work. That isn't necessarily always in direct conflict with company goals (a happy, well compensated and motivated worker will be far more productive for a company than one who feels he is treated badly. This has been proven over and over as nauseum) but oftentimes is. The catch is, what if a company doesn't want to make you a happy well compensated employee?
You seem to have an aversion to conflict. Hate to tell you, without conflict you would have precious few jobs to go to where you could realize your worth. If everyone just up and left when unhappy those spots would just be filled with cheaper labor looking to gain experience so they too can move on. Just look at the regionals. The perfect example! Huge turnover there, yet no change at all to compensation, even now when they're having trouble filling all the open slots. Most jobs will never pay you your worth unless the employers are forced to. There are very few benevolent employers out there. Even less in aviation. If you didn't want adversarial difficulties you should have taken a desk job!
But let's get back to worth. I don't know what position you have at FJ, but let's say you're a Lear 45 captain. And let's say you feel your worth in that position is $100k plus benefits. I'm just using examples so don't get hung up on the actual numbers. Anyway, there you are at FJ making your $100K. Then KR takes over and cuts your pay by 10% and reduces benefits. Fine, says you. I don't want to get all adversarial about it, so I'll just go get a job that pays me my worth. And oh look! Right over here at XOJet they pay a similar captain the same money, and best of all, they'll hire me! Hooray!
Just one problem, you aren't going to be hired into that position. You'll start over at the bottom (F/O at that pay) and will spend who knows how many years getting back to what you feel you're worth. A lot of lost income there! And if XOJet goes to crap? You can jump ship and start all over again! Hooray! And in the end, you can spend a 40-year career in aviation with maybe 10 of those years being paid at your worth (if you're lucky) all because it was somehow better to keep jumping ship rather than fight at your first place of employment to keep or improve what you have.
Good luck with that! Sure, I suppose you might find a corporate position where you're hired off the street as a captain at the money you want, but those jobs are few and far between and not available to most folks who aren't well connected (most of us).
I respect your optimism, but the reality of the world we live in these days is the corporate machine is more than happy to take and take and take from the workers, no matter how many quit, UNLESS the workers put up a fight. One of the biggest points you overlooked when you said corporations exist to make money is that the money is supposed to come from sales. If a company is making a profit, why would it want to take from its employees? The answer is greed, and it can't be countered by walking away. If you think a high worker turnover rate will get KR to maintain your compensation then you haven't been paying attention. Netjets had HUGE turnover back in '98 and '99. We badly needed more pilots to keep up with the rapidly expanding company. But hiring could barely keep up with attrition. And yet, RTS fought us tooth and nail to provide a compensation package that would keep pilots. While it became quite adversarial with our union, in the end it was the union's demands that enabled the company to keep pilots long enough to fuel it's expansion. Not everything a union does will hurt the company.
Oh, and to address your point that unions create an adversarial relationship. Really?! KR will continue to take and take from you (I know this guy) but in your mind it's THE UNION creating the bad atmosphere? Not sure there's even anything I can say to that.
By the way, it's no coincidence that the best places to work in aviation are union shops. Now why would that be?
I wish all of you luck in your endeavors, union or not. Hope next year is better than this one!
