johnso29

This post says it all.

If you actually became involved, you'd find out how incorrect you are. The careers that have been saved. The lives that have been saved. It's sad that you don't even know.

DAL 88 Driver

Come on, Alan. You're a smart guy. I know this isn't lost on you.

If you're management, and you see quotes from the President of our union (and former Chairman of our MEC, who most certainly has close ties to our current MEC folks) that tout how great things are now and how reasonable we plan to be going forward... you KNOW your expectations are that "labor risk" is pretty much off the table (seems I saw a quote like that somewhere ) and pilot costs are not going to increase significantly. Therefore, you're more likely to believe a lower opening position can result in a lower end result cost increase. That's just common sense and basic human behavior.

Now, I realize you have rationalized his quotes and put a positive spin on it. But surely you can see how those same quotes can be taken the way they sound... the way most of us read them.

Heck, even Moak seems to recognize how it sounds since he's privately claiming to have been misquoted. And then there's the whole issue of my ATL reps, who were very clear in their support of what he said in those quotes. So which is it? Are the quotes okay or not? My reps say yes. You say yes. Moak says no. Quite the conundrum, don't you think?

DAL 88 Driver

I think I vaguely remember that. I also think I vaguely remember your post as you referenced above. I didn't respond to it because I thought it was such an obviously ridiculous point that it didn't even need to be countered. Here's why...

As I recall, the rest of the employees didn't take anything like a 32.5% pay cut prior to BK. For them to get back to their "pre-BK" pay would be significant restoration... for them. For us to get back to our "pre-BK" pay is extremely little progress toward restoration. In fact, we're still not even there yet. In terms of buying power, our pay rates are currently at a 34% pay cut. In actual numbers, it's something around a 20% pay cut.

How do the other employees compare? I don't know exactly, and I don't really care.

Alan Shore

I'm sorry, but I do not see anything about us planning to be reasonable going forward. And the only truly positive thing he says is how much profit the Company is making.

Absolutely. And it was no surprise to me to read the way that you interpreted them. I was simply giving my read. Agree with it or not.

Whatever. I've heard nothing about Moak's private thoughts or musings on the subject, nor have I engaged my reps on the issue.

tsquare

And you wonder why we have such a bad reputation among our coworkers. Then again, maybe you don't know or even care. Do you have any clue how arrogant you sound?

Alan Shore

Maybe so. I have no idea what sort of pay cut the other employees took after 9/11, not to mention whether they've actually gotten it all back. I just saw Delta's pronouncement as little more than pandering.

Agreed...

DoubleTrouble

Worse, Randy Babbit works for SWA as head of labor relations. He collects a pension from ALPA while collecting a paycheck from SWA to keep labor, including pilot, costs down.

Feel the LUV?

Starcheck102

Indeed, vote them all out.

DAL 88 Driver

It was a simple mathematical statement of fact. I don't see how you could have possibly taken it the way you did.

I do know how touchy some of the other employees are about how much money we make. Sorry, but I don't make any apologies about that. If they wanted to be pilots, or business executives, or doctors, or whatever else pays more than what they make, then they should have pursued it. I certainly don't flaunt it in their face... and I am extremely respectful and professional with all of them. Beyond that, if some of them have a chip on their shoulder about it, there's nothing I can do about that. I'm certainly not going to voluntarily take less pay to make them feel better.

What's up with you today, T? I thought you were a conservative and didn't like socialism?

DAL 88 Driver

“This is really a good story,” ALPA President Lee Moak said Tuesday during a visit to Bloomberg Businessweek in New York, part of a quick tour to assure Wall Street analysts that ALPA’s contract demands won’t prove onerous to airlines. “I almost can’t stand it, it’s so good.”

Thanks to the profits, pilots now see themselves as collaborators with management—they increasingly lobby alongside airline executives in Washington. That, says Moak, deepens the working relationships. “All of a sudden, you find yourself on the same side of 95 percent of the issues,” he says.

Moak contends that ALPA pilots at the larger carriers enjoy what he calls “mature, good contracts” already. Radical overhauls aren’t in the cards, he says.

“There will be a business discussion of pay as it relates to revenue,” Moak says. “You can argue about $2 or $2.05, and that matters to the crew member,” but “you’re working on the margins” on the new contracts, he says.

Airlines have been mum on what they’ll seek in the contract talks, despite some analyst queries on quarterly earnings calls. “We have a productive and proactive relationship with our pilots and ALPA, focused on winning in the marketplace and addressing our business challenges and opportunities together,” Delta spokeswoman Kate Modolo said in an e-mail.