Originally Posted by
FirstClass
Ideally, I think regional airlines should go completely union less. Here is my arguments why.
- The company doesn't abide by your contract anyway, save your money (for that matter any regional airline)
- There would be no organization to sue in the event that one or more pilots decided to be sick (unsanctioned work action). Who would remind the pilots to fall back in line? Nobody.
- It's an employees market right now, supply and demand leverage
- I hypothesize the union is nothing more than the enforcement arm of the company's wishes. Imagine the company having to deal with employees as individuals instead of collectively. The ensuing chaos would force the company to reconsider a variety of practices.
- Regional airline pilot unions have had decades to figure out proper wording of contracts yet they still pass contracts with vague wording open to interpretation after all these years, why?
For these reasons, I believe the company needs a union more than the pilots need a union. Further, I hypothesize that the company would fear losing the union and their control.
Essentially, what I'm trying to do here is get you to imagine what it would be like for the company to have to deal with the pilot group as individuals instead of as a collective group.
In an ideal world, your theory would be correct. However look at Virgin America and JetBlue. Both companies made a big deal about how good it was to treat employees properly and how unions weren't required at "good" companies. Both airlines recently voted in ALPA by large majorities.
In your example of the pilots who called in sick, they would all be fired. Over and done, with no union to fight for them and get them back to work with back pay.
All airlines need unions. The IBT sucks. ALPA sucks. I'm sure plenty of the in-house unions suck too. Guess what, the airline management groups suck more. The unions' suckiness is still significantly better than having no union at all. Despite their many flaws, unions are an absolute necessity in the airline world, especially when safety is a concern.