Buzz, Phantom, you guys forgot about Barney Frank, and Chuck Schumer, who legislated that Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac MUST make those loans (to unqualified borrowers). Or, as Chuck Schumer put it so well "...otherwise, how will people who can't afford a home ever afford one...". There is the real 'poster child' candidates of the whole credit default swap debacle. Sure, Goldman Sachs has a great degree of culpability, but with those CDOs "selling at such a premium", they just couldn't help themselves. Plenty of greed to assign, all the way around...

 

Thanks Buzz,

I was just about to jump into the discussion and get on people for oversimplifying the cause of the housing crisis. It's easy to place blame on a group of people. Especially, if you don't identify with them. There is plenty of blame to go around, but is seems that most blame on here is being concentrated on people who walk away from their mortgages.

Didn't one of our own pilots just say they were $240,000 upside down in their house? What if he got furloughed and had to move to take a new job somewhere else to support his family? I wouldn't dare call him a slouch or place the blame for the housing crisis at his feet.

Especially, since when I was younger, if I lost my job, I can't say I wouldn't have had to move away to find another job. If I did have to move away for another job, I can't say it would have been for the amount of money I made before. With that being the case, I can't say I could have afforded to pay for a mortgage and rent in two different places for too long. Hell, I don't think I could do it for too long right now. I guess I suck.

For me, timing and luck is everything. I wish I could be smart like the other guys. But, I would suggest that some of us need to get over ourselves and wake up to see just how lucky we really are.

 

My wife has had this problem off and on with 10.5. Here's what has been working for me. FWIW there's been a lot of other people with this problem. Your gmail account may need to be unlocked to get to an email client. It's unlocked by using a Captcha. Go to this link and it should work. https://www.google.com/accounts/UnlockCaptcha

 

The 2012 flight plan sure has alot of building relationships with partners in it. The only thing that sounded like growth plans was building our brand and prescense in LA then it said we would do it in conjunction with Alaska and other partners. Looks to be a good year of growth for JV partners, Alaska, and DCI. The Delta brand is growing, but Delta sure isn't.

In the mean time the December seniority list puts us at 253 retirements in 2011 which is great. So far since the merger we are a pilot group that is 375 pilots smaller.

 

YES!!!! 100 points before the 4th quarter... 102 actually.

 

Mods put this in a new thread and lock it. That is the Alpha and the Omega on this issue and nothing else can really be said about it. Props 2 roadkill.

 

What's sad is that the America we live in today has commercials of people smiling with pride as they boast of how much they owed the IRS, but ended up settling for so much less. Or how, if you owe $10,000 or more in credit card debt you need to take advantage of government programs that require companies settle for a fraction of what you really owe. Disgusting.

 

This needs to happen not only in America in general but in our profession in particular. I structure my finances so that I can survive on 50 hours of FO pay on our lowest paying equipment (including our horrible theoretical 190/CR7 rates) and anything above that is used for savings, toys and underboob.

On a related note, the college bubble is stretching as we speak and its going to pop anyway and pop hard. Before the inevitable happens, barfing 6 figures at every single offspring no matter what to get degrees in self-discovery with a minor in right of passage, reading stuff that's on the internet for free that is guaranteed to only net them a part time barista job if they're lucky is a great place to find the money needed to live well beneath one's means, which is a hard core necessity in our industry not an option. It blows my mind that so many people so unquestionably hand over massive amounts of money to a semi-obselete system that produces rapidly dimishing returns. Then there's the vacation homes, new cars/boats/planes, etc.

I'm not talking about people who can truly afford it. And I'm not talking about people who have experienced genuine and prolonged cash draining hardships. I'm talking about the self induced paycheck to paycheck person that loses everything as soon as anything happens even though they've make 6 figures for a very long time and then some. We are worth a heck of a lot more than what we are getting and we need to be willing to strike if necessary to get it, but we need to be able to live on less. Maybe I'm out of touch but that's a lesson that growing up poor taught me and it baffles me that anyone better off doesn't already think that way cause I'm no where near the coldest beer in the fridge. If I get it, how can anyone not? Then you run into a guy who bought a 600K vacation home and lives max line to max line with no cushion. That just doesn't compute to me. Whiskey Tango What?

It is crucial that we as a group become financially able to weather storms. Ironically, being over extended hurts our ability to negotiate better compensation in the first place. Management loves dealing with a group that needs their next paycheck desperately. I'd like to see us take that leverage away from them.

 

 

Hey guys, a quick thread shift here. Who do we contact at DALPA if we think / or want clarification on how GS's have been assigned?