While this may seem like a win against the man, it is far from it. This is case of the pilots stealing the pension from their own pilots.
The A-Fund belongs to the pilots who have a promise of future money in it. The company funds it based on a schedule of predictable retirements. Pilots raiding the fund when they're not at retiring is unpredictable.
If the Fund is underfunded as a result, the lump sum option gets terminated. The remaining pilots who didn't take their money before retirement would be left with the annuity. Not sure how the annuity is funded over time, but in BK even the annuity might go to the PBGC.
If there is a run on the fund by sham divorces or by eligibles jumping ship early because of the sham divorces, this is going to hurt the pilots not the company.
This is the same group that signed a blank check to the company on the last contract, sold out the bottom third of the pilot group by closing the pension fund on them, keeping a b-scale in place, denying them medical coverage as new hires, and the list goes on. All done, ironically, to protect their retirement.
They've run out of people to raid so now they're raiding themselves, their own friends, classmates, peer group.
It shouldn't be a surprise though. They learned from the best--CAL management....the legal fees to sue these pilots did not come from CAL, it came from the retirement fund itself! Apparently there is a clause that allows use of the Fund to defend the Fund. Not a dime came from CAL. It all came from the pilots retirement fund, bringing it ever closer to underfunded status.
But not to worry, these nine got theirs.
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