I'll take being miserable at work (it's been that way from my very first interaction with airline management 25 years ago) but I want to be the highest compensated in the industry. Call me shallow but, I am in this for the paycheck. The sunshine enemas and all that happy smoke that gets blown into every orifice below your belt line and aft of your out-seams wears thin after a few years. The smiley crowds like AW, PEX and LUV (rapping tunes for pax briefings?) always reminded me more of a sorority that owned an airline during rush week, than an airline focused on safe & efficient classic transportation. I guess there is room for many business models, but for me; tradition, a semi-adversarial - mistrusting relationship between my union and my employer and a large compensation package.

The contracts that BLUE is being compared to are all concessionary.