Vortilon said:
Management claims that there will be more maintenance brought in to fill the void. Also Miami will only be doing a fraction of the B check cards that DFW was doing. In addition, the 772 Interior check is returning to DFW after a failed 2 year experiment to outsource. Word is, a Airbus interior check will be started at DFW as well. Anyway, if all that stuff gets going - that's where the head count goes to fill the void.
What void? With the amount of OT there is no Void to be filled, maybe they can go home and see their families for a change.
NY is losing mechanics and Supervisors faster than they can hire them. The MTA is sucking AA dry, better pay and benefits. We are now hovering at around 300. Never remember it this low before, and not one of the headcount losses was due to a rif, all attrition, and I know of two more retiring this month but the younger workers are leaving faster than the older workers, my guess is resignations out number retirements by nearly 2 to 1. AA needs their synergies in a hurry, its the only leverage we got, I guess joining together two groups of old guys at least gets them stability, too bad the IAM already gave it away, good thing there aren't that many of them.
IAM brags that they got 'job security" language, in lieu of a decent wage, what a joke. There really aren't any bodies out there any more and with over 70% of the workforce over 50, 35% over 60, they won't be laying anyone off, all that would do is permanently send away the very few young ones they have. Won't be long till they get us walkers with a rack for our tools and a stairclimber so we can get up the jet bridges to do gate calls?! If it takes us 30 minutes just to walk out to the gate, and another five to climb the stairs they can't afford to run lean.
When Delta and NWA merged zero mechanics were laid off. When UAL and CAL merged zero mechanics were laid off, scores of other workers were though, and even when SWA and AirTran merged they kept all their mechanics. Only a fool would give up something for the hollow promise of Job Security, we are likely to be hitting Social Security before we see any benefit from "job security". We had job security for many years at AA, until we needed it then Jimmy Little rolled the date back so they could lay off as many as they wanted to. Take the cash, its harder to take that back.
No doubt 700 will comment on how we need the protection of Unions like the IAM so we won't lose our jobs, that we should be grateful for bottom of the industry wages and job protection language when there hasn't been a significant mechanic RIF in five years and the supply is plummeting.