Originally Posted by
Packrat
Work could be a bit more diplomatic, but his basic point is valid. The ONLY reason B6 is even on the West Coast is that Angle Lake abandoned the LGB slots they got when they merged with Jet A.
When B6 started sniffing around VX, they panicked and over paid.
If they hadn't rejected Delta's need for more SEA feed they could have kept DAL out of their fortress hub. But they dicked that up, too. That created the perfect storm that REQUIRED an acquisition of VX.
And, yes, I meant acquisition not merger. It's not a merger of equals. If I was the arbitrator I'd give VX pilots DoH and no bump, no flush. Period. That's all they deserve after a decade of undercutting AS pay and benefits as a NON-UNION LCC.
Fire away.
What scares me is that management is gong to do the same with the VX routes. Turtle everything back into Seattle and let everyone else swoop in and take the California market share that they said they were targeting. Would be a shame to spend $4.5 billion and let JB take the routes anyway.
As for the undercutting Alaska's pay that's just not true. I don't think you guys realize what we actually made here. My hourly rate was $185 but I grossed just under $250k. Maybe guys sitting reserve or minimum fliers didn't make the same but I could easily credit 95-105 hours every month and still have 15-17 days off per month. At to that a 2-3% bonus every 3 months and 13% profit sharing, 12% 401k contribution and things weren't quite as dire as you might think. With the JCBA I'm looking at around 12-15% increase on a $57/hr raise. Not the windfall I keep reading about.