Agreed. Thats where it’s a who’s gonna blink first situation. The upside to negotiating with a very profitable company is they HAVE the funds to pay us. The downside is, they also have the funds to fight us. It wouldn’t be the first time I saw elites take a hit financially to prove a point.

When they say “We care a Lot!”…. That’s accurate. They care about control. They care about virtue signaling. They care about dividends. They care about SEA. They care about their jobs and bonuses.

Then…. What they don’t care about. Our job security. Any market East of the Rockies. Being prepared for snow in Seattle. The quality or quantity of their new hires. Our QOL. Whether we have a good working relationship or not. Losing revenue for a calculated period of time.

I might be wrong… hell I hope I am, but I think the merger conspiracies are born out of an abiding since of optimism that “Surely they aren’t this arrogant or incompetent.” But, unfortunately, I think whatever the $$$ cost for whatever level of what we perceive as arrogance/incompetence is baked into their financial pie.

Which means, legally, and when the time comes, we are gonna have to be able to make it cost infinitely more than they are expecting it to.