Originally Posted by morerightrudder

This is what I was trying to get at. When your job sucks, you have three general options, in order of effort needed:

1. Complain here or elsewhere.
2. Look for a new job.
3. Volunteer for the union to help improve things.

When the goal of 99% of the pilot group is to move on to something else, they are going to focus on that. Instead of spending their energy to improve conditions here, they rationalize the current situation as "it's a regional, it's supposed to suck, I'll deal with it for a couple of years". Then a couple of years pass, they're still here, and it sucks worse. Yes, it is wrong, but I'm just pointing out the mindset of our group.

I think there's also a few other intangible factors:

Fear of rocking the boat and risking screwing up their employment record. The company feeds this fear with a generous application of Section 19s. They know we are good at spreading rumors, and this helps spread fear and encourages compliance and inaction. All they need is inaction.

Younger pilot group who were not educated on the importance of a union while growing up or during their initial new hire union orientation. I can't speak for every new hire class, but mine was basically "hey let's have some free pizza".

The union has very little presence outside of its email communications. Most of the pilot group is on the west coast, yet most of the meetings are still in MSP. I've never seen an open union presence in the crew rooms.

Perception that the current union is just a rubber stamp for the company on many things, which leads to the feeling of "what's the point". I know this is not always the case, and I know our union officers work hard, but this is the public perception of much of the pilot group.

I'm sure there are others. I'm glad we're having this discussion, I think it will help, and I hope the union folks are reading some of this.