How About us?

[Hopeful]

How about this?

If Carty and top execs are getting irrevocable pensions, even in bankruptcy, so should every other employee, union or not.

 

[WXGuesser]

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On 4/22/2003 6:27:26 AM Hopeful wrote:

How about this?

If Carty and top execs are getting irrevocable pensions, even in bankruptcy, so should every other employee, union or not.

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I don''t think pensions are attachable at all, union or management. All the bankruptcy judge can do is eliminate any further payments into the pensions (which still screws most everybody except for the near-retirement people).

Someone else elsewhere on this board stated that even the folks from Eastern and Pan Am got their pensions (what was left of them). I don''t know that first hand though. Someone ought to check that out.

TANSTAAFL

 

[Hopeful]

The people at EAL and PAA who retired before the bankruptcies received their pensions in whole. However, I know of quite a few who had been retired for years before they had their pensions "readjusted." I personally don''t have any problems with protecting any-level worker''s pension. But the way this whole thing transpired is very difficult to swall0w.

 

[ART]

Let me rephrase that FULLY FUNDED

So you are saying that even when things were going to hell AA officers dreamed up a plan that they would be in their $$$$$$$ bunkers while we die on their behalf.

American Airlines officers and NOT the employees are to blame for this entire mess. They fund a GUARENTEED pension plan, while the labor groups are unsure if theirs will ever exist. The officers and NOT the employees are GUARENTEED after departure medical, dental, prescription plans, travel, LIFETIME Admirals Club membership in some cases and a ton of other benefits.

No concessions should be made by any labor group until their pension is secure as the executive group. If this means the 45+ plan is removed with “NOâ€￾ chance of AMR renewing it OR if the labor groups involved have theirs FUNDED and GUARENTEED, that’s great.
Mr. Carty, comment?

 

[WXGuesser]

Hopeful:

I agree with you that this could not have been handled any worse than it was. Management tried to pull a fast one and is going to tear this airline apart because of it.

And employees will be the ones to suffer, not management. The real world sucks, don''t it?

TANSTAAFL

 

[lownslow]

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On 4/22/2003 9:16:43 AM WXGuesser wrote:

I don''t think pensions are attachable at all, union or management. All the bankruptcy judge can do is eliminate any further payments into the pensions

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The catch is that the pensions have to be fully funded, otherwise just what has been funded can be protected. While the union pensions are not fully funded, they have been funded to a fairly large % (though not 100). Before this move, the executive pensions had been funded at 0%. So until now, if AA went bankrupt, the rank and file got to keep the majority of their pensions, and management got nothing. Now management gets something, too, though from reports their fund is still funded at a lower % than the union funds. So if AMR goes bankrupt now, the unions get partial pensions, as does management, though management still gets a greater cut from what they had been promised in their pensions.

Personally, I don''t think there should be any strong reason to protest this move to protect management pensions, IF the management pensions stay funded at a lower % than the unions. If the unions are 70% funded and management funds are 100% funded, then this becomes a problem. But if union funds are 70% funded and management is 50%, then what is there to complain about?

 

[WXGuesser]

Lownslow:

You''re right...I just didn''t make that point clear. Thanks for the clarification.

TANSTAAFL

 

I have a feeling you are not a part of any decision making team for AA, with that comment of yours, which I do respect, I have a hard time understanding where it came from.

 

[WXGuesser]

IIRC from the news reports, the management SERP is funded at about 60%. It has existed since 1985, but had never been funded.

I do not know at what percentage the employee pensions are funded, but I think lownslow is right, that the employee pensions are at a higher percentage than that.

What that SERP does is it gives management pensions the exact same level of protection that employee pensions have in bankruptcy. The funds already in the employee pensions cannot be affected in any way by bankruptcy.

TANSTAAFL