AMR responds to pilot union’s billboards
 

AMR Corp., the parent company of American Airlines Inc., has called the placement of two billboards by the Allied Pilots Association near Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport ‘the latest in a series of desperate attacks to put pressure on the company so it will give into the APA’s outrageous contract demands.”

The billboards, located on the south side of State Highway 183 in Euless and the east side of State Highway 360 in Arlington, point out that executive bonuses at the airline since 2006 have totaled $296.5 million. One version states that 27,000 jobs have been lost at the airline in recent years.

In response, American spokeswoman Missy Latham said: “It’s important to note that our management compensation is market-based, similar to that of many U.S. businesses including airlines. It is the same structure that has been in place for more than 10 years and is designed to align the long-term interests of shareholders and management. The value to individuals is completely at-risk and based on strict performance criteria.”

The airline also said the APA signs do not include statistics that compare American salaries to the market average.

“We’ve been very clear with the current APA leadership team that signing a deal that puts our pilot costs 275 percent above the industry average is not an option,” the airline said. “While we continue to look for ways to find workable, realistic and positive changes to our pilot contract, misguided attacks like this are disappointing and detrimental to the negotiations process.”

According to a statement put out by the APA, senior executives at American are due to receive bonuses again next month. "By contrast, the pilots have given up billions in compensation since 2003. During the same period, thousands of pilots lost their jobs through furloughs, while many of those remaining had their pay cut in half."

APA's statement said the group objects to the "extremely disparate rate of financial recovery between senior executives and front-line employees, and believes that shared sacrifice should result in shared reward."

Copyright 2009 bizjournals.com

AMR responds to pilot union?s billboards: bizjournals.com Business News - MSN Money

Is losing millions per quarter part of the "strict performance criteria?"
275% above the industry average?? How can these quoted personnel keep a straight face while saying these things?? They need to go to Hollywood where they can make more money as actors/actresses.

I personally like that Billboard. I mean my god 286million. That's a 777.

It's clear greedy management is full of lies and possesses no good faith at all. Time to fight fire with fire.

Same Old...
 

APA has a valid point: No Exec bonuses until AMR is profitable. But, AA has a point---they can't give unrealistically high raises in this economy (but it doesn't hurt to ask!). By the time this all gets worked out, I'll bet AMR is profitable, the economy has recovered and APA will get raises. And while you're at it---FIX THE RSV SYSTEM! Best of luck.

In response, American spokeswoman Missy Latham said: “It’s important to note that our management compensation is market-based, similar to that of many U.S. businesses including airlines. It is the same structure that has been in place for more than 10 years and is designed to align the long-term interests of shareholders and management. The value to individuals is completely at-risk and based on strict performance criteria.”




Just like those rat bastards at AIG....

AA:mad:

Here's a newsflash. The market standard management bonus is way too high.

True but they are the ones that are on each other boards. There is no way to change that. The rich get rich and stay rich for a reason.

Heyas,

Interesting that APA wants to recapture ALL flying back to the mainline.

If they accomplish one thing, I hope that's it.

Nu

I recently looked at the pilot compensation package for AA on this very website.

You AA guys are paid plenty well, and in light of our deflationary economy can be considered overpaid. You have no case for a new contract.

Of course the same can be said for management.

Too bad the media won't jump all over this story like they did with the AIG bonuses.

Stupid AMR. "We don't have enough money to give you employees a raise, but we have enough for our millions of bonuses!"

ironspud's sig line 604 804 is ode to the standard ex TWA brief.

When i first started with AA I too, thought the Flight Instruments Switches Bugs response on the checklist was too long. I remember thinking, "Is this guy going to respond to every switch position?" Then OMG he's still yacking away.
When I flew for Horizon Air we used to be able to say "Standard Brief"
for TO brief, or appr brief.

ironspud how's that 747 CA job paying you $98 bucks an hour going?
You do realize there are guys that think YOU are paid plenty well, and in light of our deflationary economy can be considered overpaid. You have no case for a new contract.

I took PSY in college and studied Jung. There is a personality profile called "The Hero" archetype. This is a person whom when facing what appears to be insurmountable odds He throws his arms up in the air and resigns.

You apparently are ex-TWA and are furloughed. I may never understand the depths of what you've been thru. I can only emphathize.

As you are aware yes there are some things not going well at APA right now. But this group will get a contract. It will be worth coming back for.

Negotiations are negotiations. Both sides don't want to back down. Both sides sing the blues.

I would not do one thing different than APA's opener. Does or has AA managment considered the economy when they've awarded themselve over 265 Million in the last 3 years in bonuses. That's almost all the money they've made in the last three years. Hint, the economy has been bad the last three years.

If the time for you to return to AA happens I do not think you'll feel this way.

I am glad that APA's will not negotiate against itself. Only in the final hour of negotiations does the real negotiating start.

In this declining economy, using your opinion, why did the Alaska pilots appear to be close to getting some raise?
Aren't they and their managment operating in the same economy?
Sincerely,
7576

The pay issue is just a bargaining position. My problem with APA is they're not advertising AA's position on scope, which would basically allow AA to operate with ZERO pilots on the AA seniority list. How's that for unreasonable?

What are your fears? That they'll farm out all domestic NB to Eagle? I think Eagle is big enough, and has plenty of RJs---what is it, like 275 jets now? Scope is definately important. Just not the only thing.

Oh boy...

If this spokeswoman is speaking on behalf of that management staff (which is safe to conclude), they have some seriously, seriously flawed ideas on compensation and management "packages".

She is speaking on their behalf but I am sure she did not get a bonus. Wonder if speaking these words made her want to barf.

If you have to fight for one thing, Scope should be it. Look at what's happened to TSA with Gojet, Midwest with RAH, and United with that new "arrangement" with Aer Lingus... Management would have NO problem farming out as much flying as they could get away with...

Not likely, unless the APA comes up with more concessions in compensation to pay for that demand. They'd be the ONLY Major airline pilot group flying their RJ feed system too and that would be unprecedented and (for AMR) unthinkable.

I think it's pretty clear that AMR believes it cannot afford to bend over and has no plans to. The APA cannot afford to blink (lest their leadership be drawn and quartered by the membership), so that means the most likely scenario is a nasty confrontation that the courts will ultimately solve.

Look for a much smaller AA and substantially relaxed scope. AMR ultimately believes it will be more profitable and competitive with that equation anyway and although many pilots might quit, they'll be hideously overstaffed anyway if there plan comes to fruition.

Barring a sudden and unlikely embracement of compromise by the APA, this conflagration is inevitable and IMO, AMR will come out far less bloody then the pilots.

Eagle's not going to score any touchdowns in this game. In fact, Eagle is in the bleachers watching like everyone else. Eagle will gain something, but lose a lot as well. Eagle will shrink substantially as another feeder is brought in and THEY will be doing a lot of the flying that Eagle now does for AA.

Don't ya just love it ?

BINGO! I agree 100%

Not to defend anybody at the AArrogant Phallus Association, but... the problem is not that they are overpaid; the problem is the rest of the industry is underpaid.

Ummm, very much understated. You make no bones trying to pick on APA guys as being at or near the top in the industry per this website (which only reviews hourly scales and does not include duty hours, reassignment rules and quality of life issues)... and then whitewash it with "the same can be said of management." Go do some research, AMR management is in many cases paid 10 times more than the nearest competitor.... before their bonus money is figured in...

You can keep making snide remarks, or you can admitt that in 2003 when every single employee of this company kept the place out of bankruptcy on the promise of management to make things right..... only to be shafted while they rolled around in money.
In the old days, if a company did well, everybody did well, from the top CEO on down to the washroom cleaner... the old methods of business management are gone. Replaced by the "me" generation... raised by MTV, and taught that ethics are meaningless so long as you glean every cent of profit you can from anyplace you can get it. That is the mentality of airline management the last 20 years.

The rest of the nation is only now beginning to realize what airline employees have been dealing with over the last few decades, since now Wall Street has taken a page from airline management play books and are doign the same thing. Run the business into the ground, steal every penny you can, then "reorganize" in bankruptcy, or get a government bailout. Airlines used to do that ALL THE TIME.... nobody did anything to stop it. Airline business models are being used in top Ivy League Schools to teach business administration... is it any wonder we have the economical mess we have today?

Unprecedented? You need history lessons. A return to the old, original, business models... maybe

Ok, and if there were a bottomless pot of gold in Arpey's office... do you think they would say any different? Nobody is saying there is an endless supply of money, people are saying the way it is divided up is wrong. Managment gets a disproportionate level of that compensation.

Actually, it's the other way around. The leadership is more hardline than the average line guy. But that's ok, unions need strong motivated individuals in those positions fighting for the best deal they can get.

Smaller AA? You mean because the ENTIRE industry is reducing capacity right?

You have a very defeatest attitude. In reality, the pilots have nothing at all to lose by demanding as much as possible...

You work at Eagle right? Have you even read your union's own arbitration results over the last time AMR tried to subcontract. I don't even work there, and I've read it. I'll save you the time, it basically said, unless Eagle was already in maximum growth mode and unable to meet AMR additional flying needs, there wasn't a need for outside contracting. That was based on AMR's own statements.

Wow Mason 32 your right! Thanks for helping out Eaglefly he is an old AE CA and sometimes get lost if his FO forgets to give him his Alzheimer’s medication. I think the APA will get what they want but my fear is the AA pilot group will give up on scope and work rules to keep pension and pay? It seems to be rational for mainline pilots.

This is my first Pilot vs Management.

GO APA!!!

He is right, AA pilots will be offered two options: make $300 an hour again and retain decent retirement bennies, or make $225 an hour and keep scope. We know what you will choose, its what has been chosen so many times before to get us where we are at today. Don't be a selfish fool.

Too much snow and not enough kisses in MSN has chilled you my brother.

Of course, they have nothing to lose. It's standard practice to widen the "box" as much as possible. If you don't know what that is (in reference to labor negotiations), call the APA office and I'm sure they'll advise you as you've clearly become the the American Eagle representative of the APA.

I'm not arguing what AMR can pay.

I'm not arguing what AMR SHOULD pay.

I'm not arguing what AA pilots are entitled to (which is one HELL of a lot more then they've gotten).

I'm arguing what AMR believes they can and cannot accept, be it rational or not.

You'd think after 8 years here, you'd understand your nemesis, but your propensity to confuse what you want and believe SHOULD happen with what a dysfunctional and hopelessly self-centered corporate management "team" will ultimately do.

Smaller "AA", because more of their flying will be ultimately assigned (NOT taken) by dupes and saps who have no say and work for less.

That's you, me and the "players to be named later".

That's what it appears to be coming down to. I'm not advocating it, but PREDICTING it because I see no viable alternative that the adversaries can live with.

Are you familiar with the Middle East ?

It's 2009 and conflict and intransigence rules nowadays.

Did you recently leave ?

That's new to me.

I've read plenty and am more familiar than you think.

A new kid on the block.............whattya gonna do ?

It's easy to slouch into the old "geezer" attack (common among the 500 hour kids who can barely handle a skyhawk) and I could retort about teaching you kids to do a night visual (which about half of you cannot do), but that serves no purpose but to agree to participate in a tanbark fight with a kid.

You think a lot of things that are mostly incorrect and worship what you WANT to happen as opposed to what past history, current economic conditions and leverage will produce.

I'd love for you to be right - that the APA will bring AMR to their knees. In fact, after they do that and the mechanics and even perhaps the flight attendants also then do the same (intoxicated by the pilots success, the companies weakness and smelling AMR blood in the water), that the APA will hold onto their gains and AMR will suddenly place the interests of employees above their own corporate capitalist needs.

But thats the "hash pipe" version of reality. I thought that at least 3 times over the last 20 years myself and NOT ONE of those ended up happening. In round 4 for me, mainline pilot odds (and leverage) are WORSE then the last 3 trips around the block.

Welcome to the party kid...............you're in for a painful and frustrating education.

LMFAO.................you made my day.

Eaglefly how you make me laugh! This is what happens to a 20 year Eagle CA that tends to mix Viagra, Alzheimer’s medication and O’doul’s together. They just start talking crazy and doom and gloom. I am hoping that APA has learned from the past mistakes. But I don’t expect much because elb14 is right!

Eaglefly try to give something for us FO’s to be excited about. We don’t have much. When we actually get the privilege to fly with each other you can teach me how to make an ILS and I will teach you how to fly an L-100 AKA civilian version of a C-130H into Luanda airport in Angola. Not all of us FO’s got hired with 500 hrs but I was still professional to them all.
Thanks for the warm welcome. Yes I have a lot to learn but that’s why I am asking so many questions. The airline industry is very interesting.

Cheers Bru!

Here's the Dallas news vid about the billboards.

Billboard Expresses Allied Pilots Association's Anger Over Exec Bonuses - cbs11tv.com

You keep on hoping.

It's interesting you fail to realize it was YOU who threw the first rock and feebly attempt to rationalize your continued harangue, then lament a poor old geezer for his retort.

Viagra ?

Alzheimers ?

Is that the best you can do?

I'd have been happy to give you a warm welcome if you hadn't kicked me in the nuts first.