capncrunch

Things are heating up early today! Hope this helps....

Sink r8

You don't think that, if you remove the financial incentives to fly a larger airplane, people would pick flying closer to home, or flying that's less tiring, etc.? I think our category lists are very much influenced by money. It's not the sole incentive, but it's a major incentive. Some individuals go against this trend, but in the aggregate, there it is: the higher paying categories are senior. You can validate this by looking at airlines such as British Airways where (I believe) there is no financial incentive to fly larger airplanes, and the senior guys are flying shorter NB trips.

Sink r8

Very soothing. Thank you.

tsquare

IOW, much better to have a crappy QOL your entire career.. got it.

tsquare

Really ACL? And my point is strictly one sided. Good grief, I think it is time for me to cuss somebody out and get banished from this board.

tsquare

Yeah, you're an ***wipe.. is that better?

Columbia

I've heard countless times that long haul flying affords a higher QOL and is less stressful than 4 day, 15 leg, 22-hour DC-9/MD-88/90 trips.
What happens to pay rates if the Company decides to park widebodies? It's a way for them to control payscales.
Finally, if BA has a longevity pay system, let's get feedback from their pilot group as to how it's working over there. Or has dalpa already had in depth discussions with them to see if it is something which makes sense?

acl65pilot

As I see it, the point being made is, all categories would be really senior, then really junior allowing less downbids and backfilling to furlough. You could uniformly cut capacity across the board with less of an effect wrt to cost and training. The flex would be much easier to manage for the company than the current pay system.

APA has new hires on the whale, we do not. Pay is the reason guys sit reserve on it when they can hold better trips on lower paying jets. Take that away and really junior pilots will get to fly the 744/777 as those guys that are currently doing no longer have a pay incentive.

Sink r8

I thought you weren't discussing this anymore?

I wasn't making a value judgement on either system, but I was answering Columbia's question. I'm pretty sure people are driven by money towards higher-paying categories, which forces them to make QOL compromises. I think you and I agree on this point. And this is a pro-LBP observation. You do have some valid points, after all. There are other reasons I think LBP is not a great idea, but I wasn't debating them here. And neither one of us is saying 744's will be parked. But you said, in the context of that hypothetical, that it should show us all the value of a LBP system. Ufortunately, your timing is poor: it's pretty obvious that a LBP, by allowing people to distribute more evenly based on QOL decisions, would actualy create a less "stovepipe-like" environment where it would be easy to curtail flying, either fleet-by-fleet, or system-wide. And it would be a cinch to furlough, because the distribution of junior pilots would be more even across fleets.

Columbia

Who's APA? American? If so, every junior pilot (read:12 year+ seniority/longevity) is on the -80 on reserve. Same with UAL and US. The only thing a 12+ year junior pilots can hold at each of these companies is reserve on the smallest/lowest paying plane they have. The current system certainly didn't stop them from furloughing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't junior pilots at each of those Co's be paid more as their pay were based on longevity? They are now and have been effectively stuck at narrowbody pay scales for years. Thx-just trying to truly understand both arguments.