Originally Posted by Alan Shore

Conventional wisdom seems to be that the company will again come after productivity in the next negotiation. As such, I certainly don't blame ALPA for asking us our feelings about the various ways in which management might seek to address that. We each need to give loud and clear answers to these questions, so that there is no ambiguity as to how the pilot group feels.

I do have one question, though, for the crowd. Has anyone ever done or seen a study on whether it is better to become more productive (assuming that you can capture 100% of the value of that productivity in higher pay rates) or remain as is?

For example, suppose you make some sort of change in the contract that makes you more productive, e.g., higher ALV, pay banding, vacation sellback, whatever. Suppose further that you accurately determine the value of the resulting decrease in required staffing and increase pay rates by an equivalent amount.

The result is that each pilot will progress in his career at some slower rate, resulting in less seniority, slower upgrade, etc. At the same time, all pay rates will have been adjusted upward by some amount. Assuming the pilot flies the same number of hours or days either way, would the slower time to upgrade eventually overcome the higher pay rates overall, or vice versa, or would it make no difference?

Honest question -- I have no idea. Anybody?