Originally Posted by
lineplug
I've been doing some thinking. In the grand scheme of things everything involved in the negotiations boils down to money. That is where the focus should be. Two of the most items that have people fighting mad are the sick leave and LCA concessions. How much money do those two items really cost the company. After all, using the info we are getting from DALPA, sick leave is only abused by a few and the LCA change will only affect 2-3% of FOs. If these items only apply to such a small group then how much money could they actually cost the company?
The real money is the PS change which will reportedly save the company enough to cover our raise plus some. Which of the items does the company really care about? We need to make sure that we don't let the opposition control our focus.
Someone brought this up here a few days ago. What do we think would happen if the company announced, on say the 23rd, that the proposed changes to sick leave and LCA trips would be scrapped? I wager the TA would pass.
I may be wrong about this but it would be a masterful bit of negotiating by the other side. Tell us the number one priority is sick leave and throw the LCA trip grenade into the room to fragment the pilot group and keep the focus off the real issue (PS) . Did someone just pull the Jedi mind trick on us?
Any contract in the era of record profits should have a lot more money in it!
I thought the same thing initially until I saw Donatelli lose control of himself at the ATL road show. That's not somebody trying to pull off a Jedi mind trick on pilots. That was somebody doing a Frank Lorenzo impression that not even Richard or Ed would have done in front of pilots. Donatelli and the administration is selling this as if their futures depend on it. I'm quite certain, it does.
Your question about why the LCA trip pulls from FO's would be sought given their relatively low savings of money is important, and you really already answered it yourself. It's NOT about money. It's one of three concessions that are really about DIVIDING the pilot group into three tribes. LCA trip pulls makes all FO's angry at all captains for voting YES. The E190 B scale makes E190 pilots angry at every other pilot for voting YES. The Atlantic JV concessions will make pilots who fly Europe angry at everyone else for voting YES.
The Ford & Harrison game of union busting isn't just about saving money. It's about destroying a union from within by pitting groups against themselves. Their premise is that we're totally self-interested and greedy, which makes us incapable of looking out for the group as a whole. It's an easy premise for them to assume because that's the way they behave. The question for us is, are they right about their opinion of us?
Carl