Many will say this, but often it gets lost in the overall value of the deal presented:

The longer Delta stalls, the more new hires and junior pilots that can be wooed by the lure of a signing bonus that could/would be bigger than any retro they'd otherwise get. The more distant the memories of past VEOP and retired pilots become. The bigger the "signing bonus" the more people that will be swayed by the overall deal in the end and an otherwise great contract that doesn't have full retro, but some significant recognition of the delayed negotiations will pass.

My napkin math on retro on a 20% raise is around a 1.5 billion dollar check and counting as time goes on. I hope it happens. That's the kind of raise we need after this much time and inflation and I don't want to incentivize dragging out negotiations in the future but that's a large amount of money for one item. I don't envy the position the negotiating committee is in.

I get what you're saying but at some point that $ number gets too big for the company to write a check and still give us the other contract improvements we want.

Yep, exactly. At which point the company pops the champagne and says “That actually worked! Let’s drag it out even longer next time.”

We set a precedent last time with full retro. Let’s not throw that away and set a different one this time.

Ok, how large of a day one check is Delta going to be able to write? Is there a limit? 1.5B, 3B, 5B? I mean you can't possibly think there is no expiration date on meaningful retro....

Correct I don’t think that, and to answer your question I’m not sure but there obviously is a limit when the principle is taken to extremes. Nobody is cutting a check for 5 billion. My point is if we simply yield for pennies on the dollar and a “bonus”, the company would have to be idiotic to give us an on-time contract in the future. Why would they?

My guess is a signing bonus of 30% of your previous years gross pay. With a minimum for new hires.

Not sure what went into your "napkin math", but I feel, a "fair" retro might be something like 5% for 2019 W-2, 2% for 2020 and 2021, 6% for 2022 and then however much negotiations can achieve for 2023. IOW basically a COLA for those past years for anyone who had a delta W-2. Giving a signing bonus to new hires that redistributes those COLA increases to pilots that weren't even on the property those years or a signing bonus to someone who has been on the property for 1 day doesn't seem equitable.

What would be your napkin math on something like that? Just because the company is/was short of funds(2020-2022 they still owe the rent payment and will need to amortize that out over the coming years. JMHO

So, just "too bad" for the 3000+ pilots that retired over that time? Or, possibly retired 1 day prior to contract signing? To me that doesn't seem very fair, but I may have a vested interest. Just curious what your thoughts are

I thought retro pay meant they’ll cut us a check for the difference between our new rate and the previous rate…totaled from 2019 to the day we sign.

Am I wrong? First time dealing with this…