Flight Attendants' Voices Heard: Hell No!

[banshee74]

I'm not afraid, I know how to swim, and I was a pilot conducting/directing Test & Evaluation flights at the Naval Air Test Center.


320...

And how is that Test Pilot School application coming along??? I think after several decades of a non response you need to give it up! You are absolutely amazing at inflating your creds... how about the "worked with the highest levels of management in the disciplines of CRM and flight ops procedure development...when you were a member of the "lunch club".

 

[Phoenix]

Well I can't respond to every overnight post so I'll just offer some general comments.

The FAs have been on the same wages for at least seven years and perhaps quite a bit more if I recall. So they took the only opportunity they had for improvements and said, no thanks. This was done despite having a bargaining agent spend years in negotiations with Management to produce the TA that was then resoundingly rejected. It reminds me of someone negotiating with a salesman and asking for a 25% discount on some purchase. The salesman says the best he can do is offer a 15% discount so the buyer says, well I would rather pay full price than to take your lousy 15% discount. So they make the full-price purchase and warn the salesman that they next time they come in the expect a 25% discount or they will just pay full price again.

Personally I feel for the 25% who voted to ratify the TA and are now being held hostage by the majority. That's the real tragedy in all of this.

Yeah, in your mind, you are smarter than all the FAs too. Why don't you try a litte celebrating about a labor group exercising their will, knowledge, and opinions through democracy...

I for one am proud of all are FAs that voted in such huge numbers and I respect their decision.

 

[Harry Callahan]

Yeah, in your mind, you are smarter than all the FAs too. Why don't you try a litte celebrating about a labor group exercising their will, knowledge, and opinions through democracy...

I for one am proud of all are FAs that voted in such huge numbers and I respect their decision.

So am I & he has NO CLUE.

 

[CallawayGolf]

Yeah, in your mind, you are smarter than all the FAs too. Why don't you try a litte celebrating about a labor group exercising their will, knowledge, and opinions through democracy...

I for one am proud of all are FAs that voted in such huge numbers and I respect their decision.

Well I am celebrating that the 75% got what they wanted through their vote - the same thing they had prior to the vote and the same thing they had back in 2005. Still roughly 25% wanted something better and they were prevented from getting those improvements. Like I said that's where the the tragedy is in all this.

A democracy? That's about as real as the antimatter used on Star Trek to propel the Enterprise to Warp 9. There is no such thing as a democracy where every decision is made by majority vote wth no leaders and no rules other than the will and whims of the majority at any given moment in time. If it were a democracy there would be no TA and no CBA. The FAs would vote each day for how much they were willing to work for. That would be disastrous and no one would succeed because organizations cannot maintain an existice in a pure system of democracy (which is why no democracies exist).

 

[Phoenix]

Well I am celebrating that the 75% got what they wanted through their vote - the same thing they had prior to the vote and the same thing they had back in 2005. Still roughly 25% wanted something better and they were prevented from getting those improvements. Like I said that's where the the tragedy is in all this.

A democracy? That's about as real as the antimatter used on Star Trek to propel the Enterprise to Warp 9. There is no such thing as a democracy where every decision is made by majority vote wth no leaders and no rules other than the will and whims of the majority at any given moment in time. If it were a democracy there would be no TA and no CBA. The FAs would vote each day for how much they were willing to work for. That would be disastrous and no one would succeed because organizations cannot maintain an existice in a pure system of democracy (which is why no democracies exist).

Sorry, I'm not smart enough to keep up with your unbounded intellect and didn't even have the strength to read your whole post. When you argued to shame the 75% for abusing the 25% then I knew you are far too smart for the rest of us, and i personaly had to take a break. Keep teaching us and please be patient toward your slow students.

 

[USA320Pilot]

Banshee74,

I'm retired from the military. Not hyping at all. I was the Project Officer for the E-6 TACAMO Program; as well as a number of other projects before I left active duty. I'm not sure what the lunch club is. Nonetheless, this is not about me. It's about angry people who like to shoot the messenger because they cannot debate the facts. And, on this board it's about people not afraid to have their identity known while others are cowardly and refuse to PM their identities. Hummmm...

As far as our F/As they deserve as much as they can negotiate and I hope their decision to reject the TA works out for them. Their MEC Officers and JNC recommended the TA because they thought it was the best deal possible. Time will tell if the rank-and-file's decision, which is their choice, will hurt or benefit the F/A group.

It is clear to me Doug Parker does not believe thier will be another TA soon. I could be wrong, but I don't think so at this point. Parker's comment that "We will now consult with the NMB and AFA leadership to determine the best steps going forward to one day reach a ratified agreement" and especially "one day" was made with specific intent. What was the intent and is he providing a third-party comment to the AFA MEC and the union's members? Me thinks so...

With the difference in "yes" and "no" votes and the company presumably not going to increase their costs any further, the JNC may be able to move money around a TA, but other than that the AFA could see their negotiations "parked."

One wild card is the potential AA merger...

320

 

[MyrnaMinkoff]

Well I can't respond to every overnight post so I'll just offer some general comments.

The FAs have been on the same wages for at least seven years and perhaps quite a bit more if I recall. So they took the only opportunity they had for improvements and said, no thanks. This was done despite having a bargaining agent spend years in negotiations with Management to produce the TA that was then resoundingly rejected. It reminds me of someone negotiating with a salesman and asking for a 25% discount on some purchase. The salesman says the best he can do is offer a 15% discount so the buyer says, well I would rather pay full price than to take your lousy 15% discount. So they make the full-price purchase and warn the salesman that they next time they come in the expect a 25% discount or they will just pay full price again.

Personally I feel for the 25% who voted to ratify the TA and are now being held hostage by the majority. That's the real tragedy in all of this.

More appropriately, CallawayGolf, since you seem to be so fond of oversimplified analogous scenarios (business-y kinds of hypothetical exchanges, I see, likely culled from the pages of a Carlton Sheets get-rich-quick infomercial workbook), it's actually like an exhausted, abused (and enormous!) preponderance of the hos demanded a fair share from the greedy, lying pimp after years and years and years of laboring under his abysmal regime.

And I would have taken you for one who upheld the idea of majority rule, as it is one of the tenets upon which this great nation is based--your ilk is forever crowing about all things perceived to be antithetical to the American way. To that end, how does a seventy-five percent rejection of an insulting, substandard TA a "tragedy" or a hostage crisis instead of what it is?: The vast majority sending a message, a mandate, in fact, that this b.s. ain't gonna cut it.

 

[Tim Nelson]

It will be interesting to see the next steps, the loss of the time value of money, and how NMB Mediator and former US Airways pilot Gerry McGuckin will react.

The fact is that the tentative agreement was not suitable to the vast majority of flight attendants. Not sure if time is an issue since, implicitly, this vote indicates that most of the flight attendants consider their job a career and aren't willing to bank on short term oil. At any rate, one thing is for sure, management needs to settle its housekeeping matters to help convince other entities in a merger that it is serious. I haven't kept up with flight attendant issues but I'm not sure anything is lost with this rejection. I mean, logically, it's hard to grasp that any next offer would be worst than one that collided with a 75% rejection, unless management wants to dig-in, and war. Just doesn't make 'good sense'.

regards,

 

[UPNAWAY]

I think the issue is the next offer may be two years down the road.

 

[Kev3188]

And I would have taken you for one who upheld the idea of majority rule, as it is one of the tenets upon which this great nation is based--your ilk is forever crowing about all things perceived to be antithetical to the American way.

Yeah, you'd think that, but it only happens when it agrees with their agenda.

 

[FWAAA]

One wild card is the potential AA merger...

Looks like the US/HP FAs will stay low-paid for the time being. So if the "potential AA merger" comes to fruition, which direction do wages go? After AA abrogates the contracts and imposes its 1113 demands, the average AA pilot will still make tens of thousands more, on average, than the average US pilot. The average AA FA will make about $10,000 more than the typical US FA. AA isn't seeking to slash wage rates, just change the workrules so that the pilots and FAs work more hours for the pay they're already getting.

So from where does the money come to dramatically raise the pay of the US pilots and FAs? Does Parker put AA back into Ch 11 to slash and burn pay rates? Or does Parker attempt to run a combined US-AA as a split operation, paying the nAAtives substantially more money than the US and HP split operation?

 

[AAviator]

So from where does the money come to dramatically raise the pay of the US pilots and FAs? Does Parker put AA back into Ch 11 to slash and burn pay rates? Or does Parker attempt to run a combined US-AA as a split operation, paying the nAAtives substantially more money than the US and HP split operation?

Good luck getting an answer..

 

[Barrister]

Well I am celebrating that the 75% got what they wanted through their vote - the same thing they had prior to the vote and the same thing they had back in 2005. Still roughly 25% wanted something better and they were prevented from getting those improvements. Like I said that's where the the tragedy is in all this.

A democracy? That's about as real as the antimatter used on Star Trek to propel the Enterprise to Warp 9. There is no such thing as a democracy where every decision is made by majority vote wth no leaders and no rules other than the will and whims of the majority at any given moment in time. If it were a democracy there would be no TA and no CBA. The FAs would vote each day for how much they were willing to work for. That would be disastrous and no one would succeed because organizations cannot maintain an existice in a pure system of democracy (which is why no democracies exist).

With each post you are displaying that you have not the slighest clue how the world works. Are you nearing meltdown like your NIC 4 buddy or res???

NICDOA
NPJB

 

[CallawayGolf]

More appropriately, CallawayGolf, since you seem to be so fond of oversimplified analogous scenarios (business-y kinds of hypothetical exchanges, I see, likely culled from the pages of a Carlton Sheets get-rich-quick infomercial workbook), it's actually like an exhausted, abused (and enormous!) preponderance of the hos demanded a fair share from the greedy, lying pimp after years and years and years of laboring under his abysmal regime.

And I would have taken you for one who upheld the idea of majority rule, as it is one of the tenets upon which this great nation is based--your ilk is forever crowing about all things perceived to be antithetical to the American way. To that end, how does a seventy-five percent rejection of an insulting, substandard TA a "tragedy" or a hostage crisis instead of what it is?: The vast majority sending a message, a mandate, in fact, that this b.s. ain't gonna cut it.

Where would you ever get the impression that I would support the notion of majority rules? I wouldn't trust the majority to make decisions that impact my life. That's not liberty; that's not freedom; and that's not the American way. I don't take a poll of my neighbors to see what they think I should eat for dinner, or what kind of car I should drive, or where I should go on vacation. Likewise, I don't support a majority of my neighbors deciding what I can and cannot with my money or my personal property. I don't support a majority of Americans who might decide that we should confiscate Bill Gates' assets and distribute them to those of us "less fortunate" than he. I don't support the majority if they should decide that killing people as a convenience (born, unborn, old, sick, whatever) is a proper thing to do.

The majority does not define right and wrong or the rule of law. The majority is more often than not wrong which is why our founding fathers setup a Constitution to specifically enumerate the powers of the federal government which restricts what the majority, through their representatives, can legally authorize. Freedom and liberty are personal decisions for each person to make. Turning those liberties over to the collective will of the majority is the antihisis of the way I would approach any political or business decision. Mob rule just doesn't appeal to me at all.

 

[ebwgs]

Good luck getting an answer..

Since this paragraph is all conjecture and speculation, in addition to your oft repeated disbelief of a US/AA ever happening, why bother answering? It's not like you don't have enough to rant about.