Thanks LJ.

Thanks, LuvJockey. I knew there was no way the average SWA pilot salary could be so low when the average F/O makes over $140K and the average Captain makes over $230K. The guy that heads up that MIT Airline Data Project sailingfun likes to quote, is hardly impartial. Here's a very interesting tidbit from his bio:
______________________________________________

"Prior to accepting his research position at MIT, Swelbar spent 25 years in the consulting world with a focus on airline labor cost restructuring..."
______________________________________________

"If you torture the data long enough, it will confess." - Ronald Coase

I'm on Mil Leave, but still like reading these forums to keep up with whats going on at Delta. I appreciate the different opinions/perspectives people have shared regarding the contract survey. It helped me while filling my own survey out.

When I ask my friends at Delta if they filled out their survey, I get a variety of responses:

"It wont matter"
"Its a Captains union, so they'll just get what they want"
"I sent in my DPA card"
"I filled it out, but didnt understand what most of it meant"
"yeah, I should really do that"
"I got f&*^$% in the SLI" (Basically, the union wont take care of him anyways, so why do it)
"Im just going to see what happens"

These are all responses from different individuals. No one simply said "yes", or was excited about the prospect of a new and better contract. I am surprised that more people aren't engaged at the minimum level of just filling out an online form. Maybe its because i'm relatively new to Delta, but I think filling out the survey is important, even if you don't like the union, or have other issues.

Just my .02

Deltanet-->Travelnet, book Nonrev travel ATL-LIM. Daily flight 767ER. Getting down is tough getting back is tougher! Don't trust the listings on travelnet, even if it shows available seats theres a 50/50% chance you will get bumped. LIM is just a place you gotta roll the dice on! Used to be a 767-400 (full most the time) but downsized for some reason.
I'm sure there are direct flights out of ATL and possibly JFK to Santiago.

LJ,

Your constructive engagement is appreciated. Thanks for shining truth on the subject. Hope all is well.

You're right, Bill typically is in the far right management corner in his opinion pieces, but the data is straight from DOT form the airlines are required to produce. Any errors in the data typically originate in the way the respective airline chose to report information and come from the DOT or BTS, MIT just compiles and aggregates them. By comparing datasets over time you typically can eliminate those annual aberrations.


On the other hand I think Bill is right on in his latest OP:
The Ultimate Unintended Consequence: Government Proposals Will Kill Small Community AirService


BTW, select highlights from his CV (in case you can't tell he is not our "friend"):

In September 2006, Bill accepted a research appointment with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s International Center for Air Transportation following a consulting career began in 1984. Swelbar currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors of Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. In addition, Swelbar writes a widely read airline industry blog that can be found at Aviation Articles and Commentary - Swelblog / Swelbar on Airlines.
At MIT, Swelbar in conjunction with Gerassimos Tsoukalas and Dr. Peter Belobaba, published in the Journal of Air Transport Management a paper entitled: Cost Convergence in the US Airline Industry: An Analysis of Unit Costs 1996 - 2006. The topic maintains high interest today.
At MIT, Swelbar in conjunction with Alex Cosmas and Dr. Peter Belobaba, wrote a White Paper entitled:
Framing the Discussion on Regulatory Liberalization: A Stakeholder Analysis of Open Skies, Ownership and Control.

Alaska Airlines: Advised the airline on competitive issues facing it following significant cost reduction efforts at competitor airlines. The program provides an analysis of the “real time” and prospective impact on the carrier’s operations and workforce.

May 1999 Proposition RJ: An Alliance to Enhance Airline Competition. The industry’s first major study examining the impact of scope clause limitations on regional jet deployment. The research examined how scope clause limits put some carriers at a competitive disadvantage and restricted air service in some communities, helping to dispel the myth that regional jets destroyed jobs.


Cheers
George

Thanks for the info. Nice to know we've been beaten to submission. :mad:

I agree. BTW, thanks for your service.

As to the indifference you've experienced, here's what I think a lot of it is attributable to. When DALPA allowed our pay to be cut by a total of 42% and allowed thousands of our jobs to be outsourced, I think a lot of folks (including myself) lost significant confidence in them. (Yeah, I know, we voted for it. But DALPA pushed it and sold it extremely hard.) Then, when Delta came out of bankruptcy, and DALPA showed no plan or even an expectation for restoration, I think a lot of folks (including myself) lost even more confidence in them. Now, we have gone almost HALF A DECADE and STILL no plan or even expectation for restoration. My confidence in DALPA at this point is basically zero. In fact, my voting reps are so "in the tank" with low expectations that I've completely disengaged from providing input to them.

Now, I submitted my survey very early on in the process. I'm just not one to give up completely... and in the grand scheme of things, the survey just didn't take that much of my time. But I think what you're seeing is a lot of guys who have given up completely and they just don't care anymore. Certainly, some of the fault lies with those individuals. But I attribute the greatest amount of the fault to a lack of direction and inappropriate leadership from DALPA. If DALPA had made our objectives clear from the start (and those objectives didn't include accepting what we have now as a new baseline), I'm 99.99% sure we would be seeing a much higher participation rate in this survey. Anyway, just my "2 cents"...

I was told that DTW was 2nd to last in participation as of Oct 21 FWIW. :mad:

As we have outsourced our work, our bargaining leverage has decreased. We now represent maybe half of Delta's productive capacity. When we come to the table with half the leverage we used to enjoy, we can expect diminished results.

In the past decade scope has been a leading indicator.

Our current MEC holds the hope to turn things around.