Originally Posted by
tom11011
My theory is that if regional airlines are going to continue to exist, ALPA is not in their best interests. But pilots don't directly control that scenario so its best that pilots find better representation at this level now. I can't think of a bigger conflict of interest as major airline pilots make the most money on the backs of regional pilots by selling scope.
Once the scope is sold and the bottom feeders (Hulas, JO, JA, etc) scramble to be the lowest bidder, there really is little independant representation can do at that point. How would a RALPA equivalent do anything different?
The connection summit groups or whatever they are called illustrate this perfectly. Everyone handshakes and backslaps, but ends up going back to their corners and voting to undercut the others to get work. Other than an IndyAir scenario, which is even less likely to succeed these days than in the past, union affiliation has little to do with the plight of the ACMI low bid section of the industry. Its a mainline problem and will require a mainline solution by tightening scope. Changing the card in your wallet will do nothing to fix the core issues.