Unions are labor’s counterbalance to the power of capital markets to squeeze every last penny out of a worker.
It’s about LEVERAGE: Labor vs Capital.
Which are you? (Hint: If you don’t own the company, you are labor.)
Come revisit this thread in a few years when the industry is in a downturn and pilots with careers families are being squeezed to the breaking point because shareholders are unhappy. They will take your pay and working conditions, that you took years to work for, and flush them down the tubes.
Come revisit this thread when a medical condition grounds you from your livelihood and your airline wants to pretend that it doesn’t even know who you are.
Come revisit this thread when you’ve had an accident or incident and the airline and NTSB are oh-too-eager to blame the mishap on “pilot error, (if you’re even alive to defend yourself.)
As for the comment, “I believe in airline unions but not other unions,” that is hypocrisy at its finest. Labor workers want the power of collective bargaining so that they can have a secure career for their families. Most other forces in the world would prefer to snuff that out, and apparently you do too.
Look at the US shipping industry from 1950 to 2000 to see how good jobs are lost to foreign markets when capital is allowed to break labor’s back - flags of convenience, outsourcing, automation. ALPA is the ONLY entity preventing that exact same pattern from occurring in the airline industry right now.