Envoy Article in Zerohedge
 

Interesting read.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-...rican-airlines

Nothing new. It's still a regional airline. They can try to glamorize it by flashing the AA name around, but it's still a regional.

They’re unskilled labor at a regional airline. That’s the unfortunate reality.

I wouldn’t call working with SABRE an unskilled job. Also, you couldn’t pay me enough to deal with the passengers in the way they must.

Yeah, well up until recently you had highly skilled pilots coming to work for regionals for peanuts. The supply finally influenced the demand in recent years to shift the pay. Unfortunately, there is no real supply problems on finding people off the street that will come and learn SABRE for measly pay and AA flight benefits. And with pilot costs going up and up and up, I don't see them raising the pay of other positions any time soon.

What kind of progressive drivel is this?

As long as they have qualified people applying, then they are not paying too low.

This. ^^^

Oh, wait. I thought you were talking about pilots.

Well, the company’s thoughts are the same for every labor group.

Do regional gate agent really make 50% of mainline? If so, is there a gate agent shortage at mainline? Whats the justification to pay them more? Don’t regionals fly 50% of the flights per day?

Regional flyer pay overhead is subsidized by the promise of lazy days watching a machine fly itself for banker bucks at the majors, "paid in experience." What compels someone to be a gate agent and endure more seething contempt from strangers day-to-day than a police officer in a vibrant inner-city I cannot imagine.

Many are part time and almost all do it for the flight benefits.

Let the truth be told. Old saying is there are only two things that can never be hidden, the sun and the truth.

If someone is working full time and they are not crack-heads, there is no reason they should be on welfare. Well neither should, but you get my point.

Full time job = can pay the bills, that’s not unreasonable.

Envoy Article in Zerohedge
 

Regional Airline is a nice word for outsourcing. Cheap labor. Putting high quality lipsticks on pigs so everyone thinks it’s AA brand. We are the problem.

Cheaper labor for the same duties.

This is the strategy to making Billions in profits to increase shareholder value and also spend billions in stocks buy backs.

My first job was working retail in a mall...full-time annual wage was $16,120. can you pay the bills in a major city like Chicago or NewYork on that??

P.S. Wasn’t a crack head. I did enjoy pixie sticks though.

I worked the ramp at UPS in high school. Everyone else besides me and another kid were there working for free essentially to provide healthcare benefits for their family.

If they can earn $12/hr at McD's, why stay at Envoy? Answer is because they value the benefits. Healthcare and free travel for family. They have no skin in the game, if they leave they aren't giving up a multi million dollar career like a pilot would, nor did they pay $50k for certification in SABRE.

The only real way to help these people and others like them is expand overall job growth so that demand for them increases. Forcing the company to pay more artificially inflates their wage and doesn't help anyone long term. In fact I would argue that the union actually hurts new hire employees because it pays the senior ones an artificially high wage that could be used to up the starting wages. This is what happened with regional FO pay until a few years ago.

That being said it's total BS there is a disconnect between mainline and regional HOWEVER I will say there is also a difference in the caliber of employee at mainline vs regional.

I see this often on my plane, leave a hub worked by mainline and go to a city serviced by Envoy, it's like the c-string came out to play.

FWIW I made $10/hr in 2000 stocking grocery shelves in high school...

Well no one is owed a "living wage".

Increasing min wage won't help, prices will just go up in lockstep...job growth is the only true solution to helping people out. More demand means higher wages. We're starting to see its effects now after wages being stagnant for so long.

Those are valid points, but did you guys see the new video in Miami? Guys arguing with a gate agent about missing their flight.

There is value and interest in the company in these folks, a lot of times they are the face of the company to the public. Think of the damage that could be done, and probably will be done eventually. This race to the bottom crap isn’t helping anyone, not even the airline.

Putting up with pax on a bad day isn’t worth food stamp money. I’ve heard part time agents complaining about being forced to stay late on weather days and how they are essentially full time agents. Are part time agents eligible for heath care and full travel benifits?

My god. When I was a ramp rat for Big Sky we started at 13/hr in 05.. Fos were 18/hr. Most agents always brought it up they made more than the pilots. Hopefully they get a large raise after year 1. People In Denver were so happy to work for F9 until Repug showed up and gutted them from the ground up. Most never went back to any of the ground ops. All at Yonited now. It’s not just AA. Remember undercover boss w BB 😂😂