WHACKMASTER

My "excuse" for accepting the job was the year 2002. Ya know....that one right after 2001 when "The Lost Decade" started?

Let's cut the chit. Stop making excuses for/championing the pseudo-scab outfit that is NAI and pretending like it doesn't have the potential to decimate many of the airline jobs in the States with quality T&Cs.

NEDude

Ah, so if it works out best for you to take a job at a "pseudo-scab outfit" (one that had a ton of Eastern scabs), bottom feeder airline, with poor wages and benefits, then it is okay. But nobody else can do it. You know you always had the option of not taking the job. Back in 2001 and 2002 I sold cars instead of taking a job at Freedom Air. You could have held yourself to a higher standard and done something else instead of lowering the bar by taking that job. But no, you wanted to get yourself into the cockpit and took a job that undercut the wages and quality of life at the legacy airlines. Your pay at Air Tran directly contributed to Delta pilots taking a 30%+ pay cut in 2004 and you have the gall to get on here and lecture others about "decimating many of the airline jobs in the States with quality T&Cs". You need to take a good, honest look in the mirror before you cast stones in your glass house.

Here is some reading material for you:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hypocrite

WHACKMASTER

For the record when I joined AT it had a LOT less (by percentage) scabs than say.....Continental, not to make excuses for their past actions.

If you were to ask those that have know me for a while, I have done more to raise the bar for the profession than lower it, and that's been through union work. Specifically being the vice-chairman and chairman of a committee that was very active during contract negotiations and also traveled to help other airlines during their contract negotiations.

I've also participated in an extended strike early in my career and have walked the line with other airlines when they struck/picketed not to mention having come close to losing my job because only a handful of us were sticking our necks out by "flying by the book/contract". So if you think that you're going to shame me into believing that I've personally done more harm than good for our profession then you're dead wrong.

The difference is that you continually make excuses for the NAI business model instead of acknowledging that the bar needs to be raised instead of lowered. It's obvious that you have a personal vendetta against the U.S. airlines/airline industry.

NEDude

Spin it any way you want to make yourself feel better. But you took a job at a bottom feeder airline and directly contributed to pilots at a legacy airline taking a 30% pay cut. And now you are scolding others who may think about taking a job that might work for them. The "H-word" perfectly applies.

WHACKMASTER

I'm not "spinning it". There were no Legacies hiring in 2002 a year after 9/11 when I went to AT. Just like I don't agree with slamming guys that went to the ME3 during the lost decade when they got furloughed or RJ pilots that went there when none of the Legacies were hiring.

The professional pilot market and airline business is finally doing well in this country and then along comes Norwegian dumping absurdly cheap seats on the lucrative trans-Atlantic market which is killing the yields of DLA, UAL, & AMR and you expect us not to be upset about it, or the fact that there's idiots willing to pay 40K to go fly a B787 for 110K/10 days off?

Newsflash: We're going to continue fighting them as long as they continue to expand into this country. I just don't understand why you're so surprised at this, but quite frankly don't care either. Carry on.....

NEDude

You seem to care quite a bit...

You have ZERO standing to sit and lecture other pilots about trying to raise the bar when YOU directly contributed to Delta pilots losing 30% of their pay. I had friends that went to Southwest in the 2002/2003 time frame, you could have waited for Southwest. You could have gone and sold cars for a little while. You could have gone back to school. You could have done dozens of other things. But you chose to lower the bar and hurt pilots at legacy airlines by going to a scab infested, low cost, bottom feeder.

Feel free to keep fighting Norwegian. Your efforts have shown tremendous success so far. In fact they have been so successful Norwegian have announced Denver and Seattle as new destinations. But with your own selfish history of undercutting the pay and working conditions at legacy airlines, you have ZERO credibility to get up on your soapbox and lecture others.

captjns

Think about it.... right in you own backyard... DAL, UAL, and AA are outsourcing your jobs. Although they call it codesharing. Why put a high dollar labor, with their own metal, on a routes to the Far East when they can outsource, er I mean codeshare the same seat for perhaps 75% of the cost and profit from it? Wait there's more... some of these outsourced/codeshare carriers have low wages with no benefits and may even require training bonds too. Haven't seen any picketing in ATL, ORD, or DFW or headquarters for unfair labor practices.

velosnow

Some of you need to learn sarcasm.

Denti

I don't see how they risk your jobs more than even lower paying european carriers. Like for example Air Serbia, Open Skies, LOT and so on. Remember, the open skies agreement gives every EU carrier pretty much unrestricted traffic rights into the US, however, unlike for US carriers in the EU, no intra-US traffic rights.

Of course their flag of convenience scheme is directly threatening european carriers, but those do not picket their LGW base or any other base for that matter. After all, NAI as a part of the Norwegian group is just a latecomer to the market, the T&Cs have been already destroyed by the likes of Ryanair, Wizzair und in some parts Easyjet, not to mention pure pay to fly airlines like Air Baltic (which could fly that way into the US tomorrow if they want to).

NEDude

The so-called "flag of convenience" scheme, as ALPA likes to call it, is regularly used in Europe, and by airlines which have long held U.S. DOT approval. Thomas Cook, a U.K. company, owns subsidiaries, with their own separate AOCs, in Belgium, Germany and Denmark. Nobody in the U.S. is trying to picket them. Lufthansa owns subsidiaries, with their own AOCs, in Belgium (Brussels Airlines), Austria (Austrian) and Switzerland (Swiss and Edelweiss). Nobody is picketing them. Another Lufthansa subsidiary, Eurowings, is operating low cost operations across the Atlantic and paying its wide body pilots 25% less than Norwegian is paying. Where is the outrage over that? SAS used to operate as four separate AOCs, SAS Denmark, SAS Sweden, SAS Braathens (Norway) and SAS International. I do not recall seeing any "flag of convenience" accusations hurled at them before they combined in 2009.