Why do people think that attempting but failing to get new rates that meet inflation is the goal? Why are TAs coming out that have concessionary rates when inflation is figured in? Should not goals be inflation +%? I see these new rates when applied to major airlines as a failure. This is the first time in decades there is a chance to pull back the losses and failures of previous contract compensation. Look at the regionals right now, inflation+ TAs being hammered out every week. CAs at regionals are about to make as much or more as legacy/major/lcc FOs that have been on property for years. This bar needs to be raised at both the regional and final level of career progression in this industry. I’m seriously at a loss of words whenever I see these things being pushed out. I’m not talking about QOL here, those improvement are completely separate in my mind and also deserve as much improvement. I really hope I am not alone in recognizing this bargaining power that has finally arrived. A raise is not a raise if inflation is more or equal to the new rates.

 

It seems like companies are content to wait out the pilot group as we get deeper in the recession. Pilots aren’t leaving legacies en masse for other legacies, so they’ll slow play.

 

Simple. Vote NO. Done. Rinse and repeat.

 

Never take the first offer! Or something.

 

Because in pattern bargaining, the floor was set this time around by the sub inflation AS rates, and there reliance on me-too catch up clauses. Let others do the heavy lifting was the over arching strategy there.

This set the floor from which everyone else is working from.

 

Because organized labor is weak and poorly understood? Pilots are unwilling to take risks needed for better agreements?

 

I agree completely.

It is also beyond frustrating that it takes YEARS to get a new contract. How did this become acceptable? The entire negotiating paradigm is ridiculous.

Before a contract expires, the union should have completed a new one, ALREADY vetted and approved by membership. We should have done all the legwork and be ready to go. We then submit it to the company. We have exactly one meeting with a mediator, during which we let him know that our offer is the minimum we’ll accept. This is our ask. There’s nothing to mediate. If it’s not acceptable we stop work as soon as the ‘cooling off’ period expires. Our current process of begging the company to meet with us four days a month is crazy. Why do we make time for work when they’re fine letting our pay be eaten away for years by inflation?

It’s insane that we wait years. SpaceX will launch 100 rockets during the time it takes us to complete a contract. And they’re doing, literally, rocket science.

 

Maybe we should drop our unions and adopt the same
union SpaceX uses. Surely they are doing something right.

 

That's not how "negotiations" works, and it darn sure isn't how negotiations works under the RLA.

This kind of bargaining attitude would result in being placed on ice by NMB and *never* released into a cooling-off period.

Looks tough on the internet, tho

 

Wow, I was going to say you have a kindergarten education on the RLA and mediation but after thinking about it I suspect you are still in pre school. Please do some reading. Lots of information available online. Try to get your info up to at least a 6th grade level.