Originally Posted by
baseball
Good words! :Why have we done a disastrous job? That's my question. How did this occur?
I just got finished watching the Colgon 3407 video. John Prater, former ALPA President had some interesting words. Keep in mind the big growth of the RJ industry and the out-sourcing of mainline flying occured under his "leadership." Recall further that the goal of the mainline carrier is to "shed costs". Instead of putting up a hand and saying "stop the insanity" ALPA, under Prater, just waived the industry along.
We didn't say STOP this madness. At the time of Colgan 3407 in Feb 2009, an RJ copilot made 16k a year. Rewind to when I was an EMB-120 Co-pilot at Continental Express, I made 13.8 a year in 1994. Insane. Mainline management's want to compete with discount carriers like JB and SWA. Their answer is to sub out the flying to the lowest bidder.
Read the research paper by someone who doesn't have a dog in the fight....
"Pilots working at major airlines are thwarting the growth of regional jets because they see them as a direct threat to their jobs. As shown earlier regional jets have created new routes, but have also replaced or supplemented traditional jet routes, taking jobs away from traditional jet pilots. In addition, traditional jet pilots can assume that they would have flown on some of the new routes created by incoming regional jets [19]. Finally, since most major airlines pay pilots based on the size of the aircraft they fly, the popularity of new smaller aircraft threatens not only their jobs, but their salaries as well. As a result, major airline pilots have fought back with scope clauses."
"Currently both Embraer and Bombardier are building larger regional jets, which can be seen in Figure 31. These new airplanes seat between 70 and 110 passengers, which means that the line between regional jets and narrow body traditional jets will blur further. Embraer believes that there is a capacity gap in the market and that the new 70 to 110 seat aircraft will help to fill that gap [23]. This new size of regional jets will further change the composition and performance range of the national fleet, making the future unclear. In addition, it was mentioned in chapter 4 that regional jets are most likely being sold at a discount or with highly favorable financing. If Embraer and Bombardier stop offering deals to stimulate the purchase of regional jets, the operational cost of these aircraft compared with narrow body jets will increase even further."
Source:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/bcf...a47a7a5b4d.pdf
Take-away: Pilots use the tools they have in their tool belt to fight back against management. We currently use "SCOPE language" to both protect our revenue stream and the integrity of the career. The union is in charge of negotiating this scope language. It can negotiate ultra strong scope language to squeeze out and squash the RJ industry, or it can negotiate softer/kinder/gentler language that allows it both survive and thrive. Most mainline pilots want bullet proof scope language that ALPA is willing to go to war on. It could be another bloody civil war. Would ALPA go to war against itself to enforce the scope language? I think not. There in lies the ultimate conflict of interest.
Here is an example regarding these 70-100 seat jets.
Right now, scope clauses don’t allow anybody other than mainline pilots to fly aircraft of 100 seats. A regional pilot group can, if they wanted to waste time, negotiate pay rates and work rules for a 100 seat aircraft. What does that do to mainline pilot scope? Absolutely nothing.
Now, if a mainline pilot group negotiated away their 100 seat scope, that’s entirely up to them. No regional pilot group could compel or otherwise force them to do that.
But if they did negotiate that scope away, it’s their prerogative. If they do that, their management would put that 100 seat aircraft flying up for bid to regional airlines. The lowest regional airline bid wins. Then that regional airline management would enter into negotiations with that regional pilot group for pay rates.
So in one instance, regional pilot groups cannot change mainline scope even if they negotiated pay rates for 100 seat aircraft. In the next instance, mainline pilots can negotiate to keep that 100 seat aircraft and the regional pilot groups couldn’t do anything about it. In the last instance, if mainline pilots negotiated away 100 seat flying, then and only then, would a regional pilot group ever get to truly negotiate for 100 seat pay rates. But that only happens AFTER mainline pilots negotiate their scope. Only mainline pilots can change their scope, regardless of any regional.
At the beginning, all flying under the mainline brand is “owned” by mainline pilots. It’s mainline pilots negotiations that have created RJs and regional airlines. At that point, they’ve ceded their rights to that flying and created a whole new segment of the industry which now negotiates for rates of pay, work rules, benefits, etc for the flying.
You can’t have a RJ airline until mainline pilots give that flying up. Regional flying always becomes after mainline creates it. It doesn’t exist unless mainline pilots decide for it to exist. Only mainline pilots can make it go away (insource) but not the other way around.