No there was no "flow up" prior to Letter 3/Suppliment W.

Many regional pilots are happy where they're at and don't see themselves as inferior needing to "move up in life" to validate their careers.

Aside from official statements of unhappiness with the evolution of domestic flying away from mainline carriers, what would you suggest regional pilots legally do to change things ?

Like it or not, RAH bought YX and is free to do as they please. I dont like it, but if I bought a car from my neighbor, they are not going to tell me how to drive it.

ding ding ding....someone will come and explain how, well you fill in the blank.

at the end of the day mgmt made the decision to buy and sell the place and everyone else are just pawns in the game.

True and just as it always is. Both AA and TWA took over many different routes from failed or failing airlines with no complaint. Hardly anybody complains when it is happening to other pilots. The complaints only come from pilots where it is happening to them.

Eagle flying does more for AMR shareholders than republic flying would for AMR. Eagle is wholly owned, the money stays in house rather than making someone who flies for AA's competitors rich.

Not trying to be argumentative, but this is not necessarily true. While it is true that the revenue stays inside AMR, its also true that the expenses do too. Thus, if the NET of revenue over expenses is greater at REP than Eagle, it makes sense to out source.

Don't like it -- but those are the facts, from a purely accounting perspective.

PG, true to a point if you are not on a cost plus contract. With our historical margins over the last decade that means that the mainline balance sheet is net negative plus the profit they are paying for the FFD or Cost Plus Air Service Agreements. It could be argued that under these types of agreements AME-Eagle actually cost AMR less money than DAL's outsourcing scheme.

I had the numbers a few years ago, but the profit that DCi was getting from operating their flights was over 500 million a year. That is a lot of money.

Of course we are going away from this model, but it is going to take something to make these operators willingly give up their profits. What will it be? More jets, jets from other operations? Maybe will will just not renew these contracts when they come due, but that is a long time to be deal with this issue.

True. Of course the key word is "if". Since you seem to know something about accounting, you can understand how being able to control and consolidate costs can be advantageous to a corporation. When working with a feeder airline, the costs of the employees, training, maintenance, facilities, aircraft and so forth are about about the same. If the feeder airline is independent, then it's management and investors want to make a profit. Otherwise they'd do like Midwest did and sell out in order to go into another business.

Consolidating purchases of consumables, sharing gates, training facilities, management, etc. assists the bottom line. While it does involve more work to operate a second airline, the profit margin makes it worth the effort.

Don't believe me? Look at the results. If Eagle wasn't worth the effort, we'd have been gone yesterday. While it is true AMR has tried to sell us or portions of us in the past, this has more to do with Scope clause restrictions than a pure business decision. The last time AMR was close to selling Eagle it's rumored that the buyer balked at all the strings which were attached to the deal.

ALPA Eagle and many of your brothers and sisters would like to take the 100 seat flying, which would put 1/3 of our guys on the street with the immediate parking of Super 80s... I can't imagine you wanting to give us anything more than preferential interviews for the FO positions.

ALPA Eagle is no different than APA. Each self serving, and protecting their own members... It will not change, and many have no desire to see it change.

Many including our own and dear beloved Beagle pilot routinely criticize APA, yet ALPA (and ALPA Eagle) acts no differently.

AA

AA

Hear, hear!

A perfect example of why having different pilot unions will only result in fighting. We need a national union with all pilots gathered together by the same rules.

Wow, what an amazing realization..... How did you ever figure that out.

AA

If only the APA could come up with a financially viable plan that would interest AMR ?

For a corporation that just ****ed half a billion patunias out the window last quarter alone, the 'scortched earth/line in the sand' strategy isn't likely to either succeed or materialize.

Perhaps it's best to wait until AMR goes to town via PPBK and solves all their problems............sure looks like its inevitable, don't it ?

I mean, Arpey and the boys seem pretty bland about it in the interviews.......could it be something that's ultimately necessary ?

I think the APA might want to start thinking outside the box and become proactive instead of waiting around for fate to slip them a rusty musket.

..........and you thought chimps only sat around eating bananas. :rolleyes:

It seems to me that what we all saw with the UAW a few years ago is happening to labor in our business as well. We have effectively priced ourselves out of jobs, period. You can cry "management sucks" all you want but the fact of the matter is when you fly 65 hard hours a month, max, and your costs are much higher than the competition, things will get ugly. I wish we could all make the "glory days" wages but those days are long gone. How many quarters of red ink do AA folks need to see before they come to their senses.

how much went to JAL?

They didnt have the numbers (or didnt say) but were getting asked why their revenue in the pacific flying was lower than the ATA forecast. Blah blah JAL blah blah Japan/Asia differences

AMR Corp. Q1 2010 Earnings Call Transcript -- Seeking Alpha

"...as long as everyone else is stapled on a national list junior to me." Recover. (In the gray, roll away...) It'll never, ever happen. And shouldn't. Unless everyone is stapled on a national list junior to me... :D

Is juvenile sarcasm another of your rules of debate? No wonder the Eagle pilots don't trust you.

The ALPA pilots I know said this is exactly why their union never made national seniority list. None of the mainline pilots wanted to risk losing seniority to another airline.

They're in denial. It may take a bankruptcy judge to convince them.

We don't need a national seniority list. What we need is one union for every airline. At any airline, pilots flying a 737 make XXX. The work rules are XXX. The scope provisions are XXX. Make them the same at every airline. Contracts will not be signed unless they meet these standards period. We need to take away company's ability to pawn us against one another. Make labor a fixed and known cost so they concentrate on efficiency and saving money in other places.

ALPA has had two opportunities to create a national seniority list in the past two decades. Each time the currently profitable legacy airlines shot down the suggestion by the failing legacy airlines. I doubt it will ever happen since the haves don´t want to share with the have nots.An interesting idea, but this was also shot down a couple times since those who make more money than average don´t want a pay cut. Additionally, if the bar is set too high, there is a concern that it will lead to cabotage just as high wages at the UAW led to more automation.