Lost Retirements
 

I think we can all agree that you deadzoners got hosed by both timing and circumstance. You gave up a lot in order to save your jobs and the company. Me, and many others, wouldn’t be here without your sacrifices. So thank you, sincerely, for paving the way for the future pilots and employees here at Delta Air Lines. I enjoy my job and flying/learning alongside you all.

No, you will not receive any more money/benefits/windfall on this contract due to your poor timing and circumstance. Life happens, and we can all agree that your misfortune wasn’t planned. Thus, our futures aren’t planned either, and hopefully most of us are saving and planning on our future screw jobs from both the company, stock market, timing, technology changes, etc. As you can attest, life happens, and it will for us as well.

While flying alongside you guys, most of us have learned NOT to trust others with our money (DB), live on half of what we make in case we get sick, and expect to live through another 9/11, etc. You’ve told us that the future is bright... until it’s not. So prepare for a turbulent career and be pleasantly surprised if it all works out in the end.

The only equitable solution regarding upcoming negotiations is to increase everyone’s pay, defined contributions, soft time, QOL, sick/vacation, etc EQUALLY. Everyone is a winner, and can choose their investment strategies individually. Real estate, dividends, index funds or hookers and blow. It doesn’t really matter, because we ALL get a raise.

Any union that robs Peter to pay Paul is sealing its own fate. Any fake letters or ridiculous posts by Jerry just inflame a pilot group that can easily navigate to the most simple, pure and easy solution right in front of them: Pay and DC raises for all! QOL improvements for all. Sick and vacation increases, etc.

Let’s all accept that life isn’t fair, and learn from the circumstances of those before us. Let’s hope we can compensate those who took it on the chin well enough to allow them to recover as much as possible before they retire.

I know it sounds like I don’t care, but I’m just being honest. If anyone from the MEC reads this crap, know that you will LOSE the bottom half of this pilot group if you decide to benefit one group over another or introduce a DB. Simple solutions and fast results have the added benefit of helping deadzoners enjoy more “recovery” time, too! So let’s work together to get paid.

And please, no more fake/dumb/ineffective letters from Jerry/gszg.



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Isn't the entire justification for your position that it should be?

No, I️ think he said there are a multitude of things that we can’t control that are ‘unfair’. The things we can control shouldn’t be ‘unfair’.

Couple things.

There is rarely a time that I can remember that all things in the contract hit everyone equally.

There are thousands of pilots in the lower half of the seniority list that were hired at an older age that would love an alternative retirement because they, like the DZ'ers, don't have the time to accumulate wealth.

"you will LOSE the bottom half of this pilot group if you decide to benefit one group over another". Don't count on it.

They’ll lose guys in the middle, like me, too. I won’t vote for anything that takes from one group to give to another, nor will I roll over when I’m called selfish. Splitting the pilot group simply makes management’s job easier.

So help me out. If someone gets something that you do not, for example a targeted retirement recovery of some sort, yet you get massive contract improvements, that is divisive. How is the converse of that not true then? Younger, more junior pilots get a pay/benefit increase that will affect them for decades.

But life is not fair for those that had so much stolen so they should suck it up.


Again.


Tell me again who is being selfish here?

How are you going to quantify 'taking from one group and giving to another'?

Show your work.

pound your chest all you want, but history speaks. There is not "taking from one for another," There are contract improvements, some benefit the more senior, that everyone will be a part of someday.

Examples, SCOPE SCOPE SCOPE, RJ's, targeted DC, Frozen Pension, claim distributions, Think the middle and junior folks were screaming about these? At the top of their lungs.

Easy. When some suggest that deadzoners, which I've never seen clearly defined, get extra retirement benefits because of the sacrifices they've made. At the same time they're accusing those of us who don't fit their definition of being selfish, which is patently absurd since they have zero idea what everyone here has gone through. Additionally, there is only so much money that will be available for retirement benefits. It only stands to reason that starting a DB or an annuity will reduce the amount available for DC contributions. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, of course, and we all get one vote. Time will tell how this plays out, but it seems to me that dividing us up will hurt us rather than help us.

It isn't chest pounding by me any more than it is by those who are whining about selfish millennials, now is it. Also, your vote and my vote count exactly the same. The majority will rule, and I will live with it and move forward.