Originally Posted by TMoney

An airline can get new, better equipment on the property without taking a concessionary contract. This idea that the only options were to take the contract or lose the job is outrageous. All airlines have shifted fleet types. SkyWest used to fly nothing but Metroliners. Now they are all gone and our pay scales went up with the addition of Brazilias and now Rjs. They didn't have to reduce the caps on pay rates to 4 and 12 years. They didn't have to raise the health care costs of their employees to do so.

The US Airways group could be happy to give the 175s to their wholly owned regional airlines and also increase the pay scales and share in the massive profits we are starting to see. They could give a performance bonus to the employees on a quarterly basis based upon our profits. They could have offered to pick up the tab for a portion of the employee's health benefits to say thanks for working hard to keep flights operating safely and efficiently through the bankruptcy. If you were the head of US Airways group and you had that 409 million profit for a quarter, what kind of a deal would you approach your employee group with? They did nothing to help share the wealth!!! They are keeping all the money. Worse, they are asking more from the individual. How can anyone be happy with someone willing to give from the poor to the rich??

I know that saying "I'd just quit if my company was that corrupt" is too sweeping a statement. It's a complicated issue and with seniority it is very tough to just quit. That is the point of a union. If I knew that my management was that greedy, I would go straight to my union and tell them to represent us and stick it to management. I would fight back. The yes voters have done no such thing. The union has done no such thing. They all bent over to willingly take it. How does anyone not see this???

The unknown consequences of a no vote could be that nobody agrees to a reduction in pay. Imagine for a second that the Stop The Whipsaw movement gets supported by every regional pilot. Every single one. Every contract sent to any of us that doesn't give us a share of the current profits is rejected. The airlines will be forced to come up with a contract that does have profit sharing or pay raises so that they can get pilots to fly these planes at all. They need these planes flown worse than we need pay cuts. I know it's a lofty and idyllic idea but it's one worth pursuing.

If the PSA pilots came to the STW movement and said we will vote no but we are nervous that the US Airways group will shut us down, we could work together to pressure them to making sure that doesn't happen. Or forcing a contract that requires PSA pilots to be absorbed into Piedmont or Eagle at their previous rates. This is all purely hypothetical and I'm sure I'll hear some abuse about how ridiculous it sounds but it's not entirely out of the question. Pilots are such a specialized labor force that we can hold the power. We can push back at management to stop this whipsaw.

Eagle was supposed to get your airplanes. You stole them from Eagle. You Yes voters need to try to find another way to work with management to stay competitive. There are other options than whipsawing other pilots just like you who are at a different company. You should be ashamed of voting Yes during profitable times. The MECs should be ashamed of letting this get past them to the pilots. I'm glad to see so many pilots speaking out against the Yes voters so they can feel the consequences of their actions. It can be done without name calling or jumpseat wars, however. Reasoned facts and statistics can be used to make that argument. Hopefully we can all band together to make sure this never happens at another regional airline.