I know guys that made $300K last year and almost never worked. You'll have to do better than that to convince us we're all aboard the train to the Gulag.

It wasn't a scam. Delta has been stupidly profitable for the last five years or so. Hell, they wrote all our names on a plane and there was rolling thunder for everyone, right? For guys who came straight from the military in particular, it is 100% understandable that this colored their view. For those of us "lucky" enough to have made a stop in a toxic sh!thole like an ACMI or some contentious environment like a regional going through contract stuff, a lot of us were happy for the money in these years but had eyes wide open for this. The older Delta guys had seen this before and were ready.

Going forward, I actually think we are in a better position. All of the people who thought they were white collar or still leadership and were ready to help out the company with suggestions from the peanut gallery, have been given clarification on their actual position in the scheme of things. We are bit rate hourly employees who are entirely dependent on seniority for their quality of life. Merit may have gotten you the job, but it has very little impact on your life compared with that seniority number. Hand out wings to kids and push folks in wheelchairs if need be. Understand that Delta hired you because you have those traits in your makeup(regardless of source-mil or civ). But you better also understand that if Delta management thinks they can save a dollar but cutting you, your ass will not catch up with you for a week.

There are many teams at Delta. Pilots are not on the management one.

Well, understand that back in the Dave Garrett days it may have been kinda legit, or at least there was more give and take. There were probably enough guys who remembered that time strongly enough to pass it on and discounted how things changed that guys getting hired later on bought into it even though the meat had been taken off, and all you had left was a nothingburger.

Some to this very day, on this very forum try to perpetuate this legend, albeit there seems fewer and fewer as days go on.

Excellent post.

Agreed. Excellent post.

Correct! Well said sir/ma’am! Wonderful post!

Well United has upped their furlough projections by another 1600 pilots or so to around 3900 projected. Hopefully this is all projecting to get that cares Act 2 ball rolling.

I think they are being realistic. In the memo they say that the plan all along was the 2300ish by the end of the year, and then another 1600 furloughs during 2021.

This is why I think furloughs go deeper than 2558 here. Sure maybe only 2558 this year, but I think it continues until this thing turns around.

probably right.. they don’t need but a 1/3 or so of the pilots on the list if this keeps going.

CFO PJ seems to think that there is not much more cost savings to be had. Between the VEOP and any other potential furloughs we will have cut ~15%+ of our pilots. I think we have “shrank” to the point management feels comfortable with to be in place for a recovery. Could it change? Sure. Would CARES 2 change the conversation, absolutely.

If we furlough the full 2558 plus 2000ish VEOP we would be down 27% of our pilot group in 18 months. Cutting beyond that level means the company/industry/economy is all in jeopardy as that means almost zero recovery has happened in a span of 2 years. Look how quickly things changed May-July. When recovery begins it’ll be noticeable.

Right now the industry and the economy has paused in large part to corporate America throwing in the towel for 2020, they are assuming 2021 will be a recovery year. They have been afforded that opportunity by CARES 1 providing corporate well fare to wait and read the scene (ironically everyone like to bash the $600 a week for the reason recovery is slow).

My uninformed, view from the flight deck, opinion is that 2021 will limp in and start slow as the election and vaccine result starts to sink in. Spring will see the beginnings of corporate dealing happen. By the fall there will be opportunity every where for all industries for whoever survived this horrible year. Or we sink into a world wide depression and series of terrible wars that shape the rest of our millennial lives.