Scoop

I think the intent is that if you retire after January 01, 2020 you will be covered under the new plan. December 31, not so much.

This has a couple of implications:

**Delaying will not save the company money as far as the MB goes.
**Since retired guys do not vote those with the most to gain by the MB will always be a diminishing number.

I am not sure that this single issue which seems paramount right now, but will in fact only be a small portion of the PWA will be the deciding factor for most Pilots anyway.

Scoop

Herkflyr

Now THAT I agree with. Having been here for awhile, I've seen "deal breaker" issues evolve into afterthoughts with enough time.

Gen6

From last springs phone poll it was obvious if you read between the lines that this is what they were angling for. I understand the drive for it but can not support it without some objective information. I called and asked the R&I Committee over 9 months ago for the following and was told it would be too difficult to prepare. Imo it is all we need to determine where this contract initiative should be prioritized.

I asked R&I to run the numbers for a representative pilot (for the sake of argument lets use a 45 year old in 2005 with 10yrs in the company when we went into BK). I wanted to know what his retirement would have been worth if the pension was not terminated and he had worked under the contracts that were in place through present minus the DC and he retired at 60 which is what the pension was based on. What would have been his annual pension or lump sum if that option was exercised.

Then take the same guy and tell me what his retirement would be worth under what happened and the assumption that the BK claim money, merger money, and DC were invested at 6%(a conservative number and well below what the market has returned over the same period.) plus his PBGC payments.

That should not be hard to do if you have the data which DALPA should be able to put together. If the delta between the old and the actual is large then the problem may have merit. If it is small then it doesn't. The conversation without those numbers makes it difficult to prioritize how important this issue is.

Buck Rogers

Come on guys, somebody help me out.

What is the COLA for the PBGC and frozen pension that was locked in 15 years ago?

Anyone? I keep hearing about inflation. How do you think that affects the purchasing power of the payouts?

DWC CAP10 USAF

I have a sneaky suspicion you already know the answer...that PBGC pension amount is not adjusted for inflation.

Buck Rogers

Oh crap. You mean that PBGC and frozen NWA pension have lost half their buying power from when they were "locked in.

Holy shiznit Batman. That truly sounds like a great deal. "Please sir, may I have some more?"

OBTW....nobody has mentioned it yet, and I think it merits consideration on just how "good" the DZ have it(or not). But I'll bet you a lot of the pilots are unaware of this little pearl! I'll also bet it won't change anyone's mind. Most only view it as a zero sum game. If it's not good for them they are against it and vice versa

tennisguru

Well speaking as a member of the younger generation, I’m not opposed to this sort of plan by itself. If we get a great contract with solid QOL and pay gains, AND this plus-up deal, I think that would pass by a wide margin. What I feel most of us are fearing is that the cost of this one item will be so great that either 1) there will be minimal gains in all the other areas of the contract and/or 2) the company won’t play ball and since the union won’t budge on this one item, negotiations will drag on far longer than necessary.

gloopy

I think so too. EF'nA should release the costed out total of this proposal. I bet it will be staggering.

Scoop

Buck,

Other than Govt pensions I am not sure how many are adjusted. FDX for example, who never went through BK, has their DB capped at $130K. It has been at this level for a while and is a major issue of contention over there. Inflation is slowly but surely wiping out their DB benefit so the fact that “frozen” plans and PGBC don’t adjust is not an outlier.

Scoop

Cogf16

Because it would be a huge, unbalanced increase that would largely "miss" the old guys. It would mean hundreds of thousands of dollars for the majority of the list and HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS for the "old guys"