Part of it was opening over 300 items in the contract. That was just bad strategy.

The main part of what went wrong is three letters: N-M-B. In my opinion, they are being used by government to do something that couldn't be done by law. That is, remove the right to strike from the transportation industry at their discretion. This problem faces us as well at Delta. It is why I've been calling for quite some time that ALPA's highest governmental priority ought be the reigning in of the NMB. They are abusing their power and we are not calling them on it at all. Moak didn't even mention it as something to work toward.

I believe the reason is that the NMB serves Moak's purpose. That purpose is to minimize contractual gains of the major airlines. Moak will remind us of the NMB's ability to "park" you if the NMB doesn't like your proposal.

Carl

I don't know all the details. But he mentioned several times about how they had asked for their "dream contract" in ALL areas of the contract and that what they need to do going forward is to focus on the areas that are most important to their pilots. I believe he mentioned pay and scope as two of those top items. The APA criticizers here seem to focus on APA's originally suggested 53% partial pay restoration as being too much and the reason for their failure to achieve a contract. I didn't see anything in that speech that would indicate they are backing off of their pay or scope proposals.

Vodka? Scotch?

ALPA has been getting you pay increases and contract improvements while the vocal APA group has gotten nothing.

THAT is "...missing opportunity after opportunity..."

Just so I understand, you don't think our National President should remind us of actions the NMB can take, and has taken?

Seriously?

Yes - they had all those things, but what they were missing was this: a sense of reality.

The pilots over there needed to look at the AA's situation, look at the other employee groups were likely to get and determine what is realistically attainable. Sure, they could "demand" to bring the outsourced flying in house and fly all of it. They could "demand" pay raise of 53%. They could demand this and that, but realistically, what could they get? Remember, they are asking for this on top of having their defined benefit pension, something I think no other passenger carrier has.

AA has the highest cost structure in the industry. It's not good or bad, it's the facts. I will admit that it seems like AA has some weak leadership, but the biggest problem that we all (all passenger airline employees) face is that airline seats are a commodity. I would say the majority of leisure passengers pick an airline based on ticket price. I think probably 50% of business travelers pick based on price. So - a larger percentage of your passengers pick on price, and sites like Orbitz or Expedia, which publish Spirit's price next to other airline's price make the revenue problem B-A-D. An airline can't raise prices to account for higher internal costs like labor, newer aircraft or better service.

For example, if I look at Orbitz from DTW-FLL for a trip, Spirit's price is $264 where Delta is $268 (both non-stop). I'd say most people would price Spirit, because it's cheaper. but, when they get to the gate, and realize the have to pay for a soda, pay for putting a bag in the overhead, etc. will be ****ed and end up paying more than they would for the Delta flight. But in a year when they go to FLL again, they'll forget all about that and go on Spirit again.

Anyway - back to APA's problem. In the end, American can only generate so much profit so there is only so much cash to share with the employees. I think by demanding so much, the management just threw their hands in the air and say "we can't work with this, this is crazy".

Like I said, I think it would of worked much better to have simpler demands that the company and the union can actually discuss rather than a dream-list that takes 12 years to work through.

I don't pretend to know all the in's and out's of contract negotiation, but I do know I'd be severely disappointed at waiting 5 years, let alone 12 to get what is deserved/needed. That being said, I don't understand why a union wouldn't have justification to go out on strike way before it got to the 5 year point. Maybe they did have the justification, but decided to keep on keepin' on. Can't say I'd be one to vote for going along with that mentality.

Our national president should actually be DOING something about the NMB. But just like Scope, it is not even mentioned as a threat or even a concern. No mention at all.

A government body is abusing its power to remove the right to strike in the transportation industry, and they do so entirely at their discretion. Such a law in Congress could not possibly pass. Yet a bureaucracy is doing just that. The response from our national president located in DC...NOTHING.

Carl

That's the thing about negotiations under the RLA. The union doesn't get to decide when they've had enough, the National Mediation Board (NMB) decides. Unfortunately from what I've heard, the NMB got annoyed at APA and their shooting for the moon strategy, so they basically put them into "Timeout" and told them to figure what they really wanted before they talked to the company again.

The NMB board will let a union strike, theoretically, but (a) under Bush administration that wasn't going to happen and (b) the NMB has to believe both sides are presenting a reasonable offer and are actually trying to talk. It seems that they decided the APA wasn't acting in good faith.

It's because the NMB is acting like they've never acted before. They are no longer acting as MEDIATORS like they should. They are acting like JUDGES by refusing to declare an impasse until labor caves in to the demands of the NMB. Not the demands of management, the demands of the NMB.

Unless this is reigned in by the united efforts of transportation labor, we will all have to understand that our right to strike has been removed by the NMB.

Carl

I agree that a union should be able to strike if they want, BUT, I think that most of America doesn't agree. They think a strike is selfish, arrogant and disrupts the commerce of the country.