Originally Posted by
acecrackshot
So, what?
If the company is demonstrably unwilling to bargain, what is option B? Even Fred, in his last days, described the contract as "below his pay grade?"
I mean, I get you saying that this was the union's fault, but I just don't see it. The error was in an egregious lack of pattern bargaining, which included asking a pilot group to accept wet leases and furloughs, at the same time. And 13 of 14 then MEC members rogered up on it.
The release DID NOT suddenly render the company unwilling to bargain. The company knew it would have come with money it did not want to spend, because both they and the union missed the advent of the internet, where contracts like the APA and Fedex could be compared and contrasted.
Well, you all own the coup, now. Lots of reporting that at least one proxy was likely voted against the representative, and certainly the timing of the press release makes this appear to highly premediated.
At the end, cui bono? Certainly not pilots on the Fedex Master Seniority List, who just got handed a "Go to Jail. Go directly to Jail. Do not pass GO. Do not collect $200" card as we sit and some portion of us eagerly awaits the contractual equivalent of Santa.
I’ve been on the sidelines long enough trying to be supportive.
We’ve made no progress because our proposals were so far outside pattern bargaining that the NMB warned us repeatedly to be realistic until they finally put us on an indefinite delay.
There was never going to be movement while the NC pushed an oversized pension increase on top of pay, scope, and QOL requests. Retirement matters, but the strategy has been unbalanced.
What have we actually gained? CPAP machines and maybe one or two minor sections TA’d in 18 months. That is not progress. The outgoing NC and the now minority of the MEC chose delay over a deal, betting on some external event that never occurred to help us.
I’m at least interested in seeing what happens in the next month. If this new group can deliver a more balanced approach, maybe we’ll finally see progress. If not, we all know what comes next: recalls, the NC gets reinstated, and we go right back to intentional delay as our strategy for achieving a deal. At that point, we will have lost nothing by trying something different.