Cogf16

Death and taxes right...? Obviously, nothing is guaranteed, but this is the best financial environment ever. Cant we use our situation to try and greatly improve retirement monies? Doom and gloom is an excuse to not be a little bold.....

Cogf16

Please enlighten me to the big difference. Are you parsing my words to make a point? It's never been an exact science, since we all have different ages, seniority etc. I'm advocating improving everyones retirement AS EQUAL AS POSSIBLE. Can you imagine what 25% DC for a 30+ yr. career yields?

TED74

Has a contractual element as significant as retirement ever remained static for 30 years? How about 10? 5? Even 5 years of 25% DC would indeed be quite healthy, with or without profit sharing. But we're also nowhere near that dollar figure. If pay rates didn't go up a penny in the next contract, 25% DC would represent a 56% increase in retirement funding by the company over status quo, before we even touch MB. Since we all know we won't sign a flat rate PWA, 25% DC would more likely represent a 60-70% increase in DC funding dollars. That is an ENORMOUS figure that I'm quite certain we won't see, and even more certain wouldn't last 3 decades... particularly if we won't accept back-sliding on scope and qol (which this group as a whole will not).

Until this whole conversation starts incorporating more realistic figures (however "unfair"), I fear we're all wasting our keyboard breaths. I gave polling my minimum acceptable DC for these negotiations...I won't share it here, but it wasn't 25%.

CBreezy

But didn't you know that if you ask for something ridiculous, the company MUST to meet you in the middle? That's negotiations 101. I say we should get asked for a trillion in improvements so we could get $500M at the worst

ERflyer

This proposal needs to be negotiated and TA’ed into something like this:

For each year of a four year contract there will be a net 5% pay raise plus 2% added to DC with cash beyond 415c limits going into a MBCBP. The net would be about the same as the last TA, but a 21.5% raise and 8.24% to DC retirement over 4 years. It could be structured as a 12% raise and 8% increase in retirement on 1/1/2020 so people retiring soon get more of a benefit. Net 31% for these two items over the life of the contract.

My demographic is very senior but clearly the lump sum needs to go away.

Gotta go .... I hear something up on the roof.

Cogf16

Interesting ideas, the only problem is the 2500 guys who retire in the next 3 or 4 years. Those small DC increases dont help them much.

ERflyer

8% DC x $400K is $32,000.
Add that to the ability to add DPSP cash into a MBCPB, let’s say ~$18K (for simplicity, but close.)
So $50,000 a year more into tax deferred retirement.
Over 0-5 years it adds up to $0-250K going into a tax advantaged retirement plan for senior pilots. Not perfect but neither is someone retiring in 2019 getting $0. But it’s pragmatic.

Pushing the lump sum is divisive and would be a net $0 for everyone - because it’s not going to pass and will drag out negotiations for many, many years. Having the increased DC being equally distributed to all demographics instead of larger pay raises or lump sums is equitable. It also would produce very large retirement gains for junior pilots over time.

Cogf16

Think about it. How can you possibly push a DC increase that puts the same % increase for a 63 yr old and a 30 year old, and everybody inbetween? How than that possibly yield the same amount for the old guys? Cant we understand that the guys with just a few years left need more front loaded money than a guy with 20 or 30 years? We can certainly craft a plan that uses certain assumptions and rates of returns to get guys a similar return? Why are we so quick to discount this idea? Dont you know the MEC has been working on this for a long while.....

ERflyer

Why are pilots retiring between 2020-2024 any more deserving than pilots who retired between 2010-2019 who will get nothing?

They are not.

The exception is that those in power or have influence and retiring between 2020-24 are attempting a money grab while they are still here. Because they can.

New hire pilots and those retiring after 2024 should not subsidize or pay reparations for past economic conditions.

Why should new hires and those retiring after 2024 get a smaller raise unless they’re equally sharing the contract gain?

Cogf16

In 2010-2019, our union prioritized pay rates, work rules and scope AND the economic environment was not nearly as good as it is now. Now our union is prioritizing retirement (partial)restoration AND we are coming off 5+ Billion in annual profits for the past 5 years. Now is the time to try and recoup the losses that fell on the retirees of the last(future)10+ years. Why can't you support restoring some retirement funds for the pilots who can't take advantage of increased DC percentages??? And yes, I would support "paying recent retiree's as well.