Not supprised that some Captains feel that way. The TAs Captain rates actually topped Delta's 12 year rate with additional raises to year 15 topping out $20/hr better based on 2008 numbers. By the last increase however the Delta 12 year rate would have topped the Airtran 12 year rate but their 15 year rate would still have left them about $7/hr better than Delta's top rate.

Unfortunately to do this the FO rates were left very low and capped out at 12 years. As an example the third year FO rate was about $20/hr less then Delta's 3rd year and the 12 year rate was almost $10 less. By the last increase the 3rd year pay difference grew to $30/hr for 3rd year FOs and $19 for 12 year FOs.

IMO the pilots did the right thing to vote it down for this reason alone but I believe there were some other issues such as scope that were equally important. However considering the stagnation that has resulted I can see how some (especially the more senior Captains) could now have buyers remorse.

I will also point out that the 5 year CA rates were about $17 hour behind Deltas' at DOS and would have been $32/hr behind at the last step increase. If Airtran had made the CAs rates higher throughout the longevity scale they may have been able to divide the pilot group more but as it was it was not a good deal for most of the seniority list. (again IMO)