Originally Posted by
IAFDOF
Yeah, unimpressive for sure. Their new max captain is barely beyond our current rates. Oof.
Our MEC had better do a lot better than this. Nothing against the ULCC guys at all, but if we want to hire and retain, we have to be a lot closer to the big boys than this nonsense.
It’s not just a function of competing with the legacies—3/5 of our bases and the vast majority of our pilots are based in domiciles with the highest cost of living in the United States. Lauderdale and Orlando are no longer affordable by any means either, compared to say Chicago or Detroit.
We now have a solid percentage of ASMs on premium lie-flat and premium economy products.
From both cost of living and revenue perspectives, we should be compensated much closer to the legacies (as we have been historically).
As the premium European project expands and we begin to fly XLRs capable of generating MORE revenue than a legacy 757 (tons of premium seats, fuel savings, etc.), we should expect compensation more closely aligned with our legacy competitors. More if the company intends to grow versus shrink.
We should certainly be compensated more closely to the legacies than Spirit for the above reasons—this isn’t a knock on their pilots (who I respect completely). It’s just logic: we’re responsible for more revenue when we go fly, and we do it out of vastly more expensive geographic markets than they do.
What still puzzles me about JB’s position is that there seems to be little consideration of the impact of VDA/EPS on overall pilot payroll costs. I’m no genius, but you cannot tell me if they simply inked DAL AIP + 3%, and padded the RSV grids and padded some block, made pos space commute permanent—that they couldn’t reduce overall payroll expenditure (particularly in RSV months).
Running lean looks great on paper and protects against downside risk, but when you’re paying out massive amounts of VDA/EPS/attrition-attributable costs on a regular basis, there’s an argument to be made to just acknowledging that the cost of doing business has increased, and fixing those costs into your budget. Then you can at least plan around it.
The company needs Dave Ramsey to come in and say “hey y’all—it ain’t workin—you’re paying these guys 2x pay month after month to cover yer schedule…yer losing half yer new hires. Yer gonna have to put on yer big boy pants, and pay them market rate…or yer gonna have to shrink. Cuz this ain’t workin” 😂😂😂