There Goes Todays Pay (Down the Toilet)

[FLYUSAIRWAYS]

This is a TRUE STORY. 30 years seniority with USairways, as a CSA. Started with Allegheny back in the 70's. Still part time since 9-11. Work a 5 hr shift at $18 an hr. I earned 90 bucks today before taxes and deductions, for medical, union dues, social security, federal, state,life insurance, dental, etc. After all deductions, I make a grand total of $62.40 a day net pay.
Today I filled my gas tank, and got a haircut. It totaled $65.00. So for today, I'm still in the hole. I'm not looking for sympathy, or any ADVICE, from all the KNOW-IT-ALLS, who post here.
My point is only that if a 30 year agent, can't afford to live a normal life being a Usairways employee, in this day and age, then something is REALLY wrong. For the life of me, I can't imagine being a new hire making $8.72 an hr. Then I have to sit in on a Mandatory meeting, asking me to donate money to the United Way, ( I qualify to receive money from the United way). Do you tkink the CWA, would like to donate the $11.70 union dues back to me, since they don't earn it??? The last update on their website is dated Nov. 19th. UNREAL.
Just needed to vent.

 

[Tim Nelson]

This is a TRUE STORY. 30 years seniority with USairways, as a CSA. Started with Allegheny back in the 70's. Still part time since 9-11. Work a 5 hr shift at $18 an hr. I earned 90 bucks today before taxes and deductions, for medical, union dues, social security, federal, state,life insurance, dental, etc. After all deductions, I make a grand total of $62.40 a day net pay.
Today I filled my gas tank, and got a haircut. It totaled $65.00. So for today, I'm still in the hole. I'm not looking for sympathy, or any ADVICE, from all the KNOW-IT-ALLS, who post here.
My point is only that if a 30 year agent, can't afford to live a normal life being a Usairways employee, in this day and age, then something is REALLY wrong. For the life of me, I can't imagine being a new hire making $8.72 an hr. Then I have to sit in on a Mandatory meeting, asking me to donate money to the United Way, ( I qualify to receive money from the United way). Do you tkink the CWA, would like to donate the $11.70 union dues back to me, since they don't earn it??? The last update on their website is dated Nov. 19th. UNREAL.
Just needed to vent.

It's tough out there for sure. Corporate greed wants to break you, wants to destroy you. It's the profanity of profanities. It destroys families, everything all for the dollar bill. We are all human and it sucks when the company you work for doesn't give one rat's ass about you. Nonetheless, life is fair and good and it still comes down to others. Pray, keep your head up, love others.

At any rate, maybe I'm wrong and my thinking is clouded but I think the biggest travesty is on workers like you who are topped out, NOT those making 9 'bucks' to start. Everyone started out at the bottom and free handouts just aren't part of this industry that used to reward seniority with a family rearing wage scale ladder.
Nonetheless, the topped out workers on the ramp gave back a couple bucks an hour in the last contract as the bottom wage rate was 'boosted'.

regards,

 

[prechilill]

This is a TRUE STORY. 30 years seniority with USairways, as a CSA. Started with Allegheny back in the 70's. Still part time since 9-11. Work a 5 hr shift at $18 an hr. I earned 90 bucks today before taxes and deductions, for medical, union dues, social security, federal, state,life insurance, dental, etc. After all deductions, I make a grand total of $62.40 a day net pay.
Today I filled my gas tank, and got a haircut. It totaled $65.00. So for today, I'm still in the hole. I'm not looking for sympathy, or any ADVICE, from all the KNOW-IT-ALLS, who post here.
My point is only that if a 30 year agent, can't afford to live a normal life being a Usairways employee, in this day and age, then something is REALLY wrong. For the life of me, I can't imagine being a new hire making $8.72 an hr. Then I have to sit in on a Mandatory meeting, asking me to donate money to the United Way, ( I qualify to receive money from the United way). Do you tkink the CWA, would like to donate the $11.70 union dues back to me, since they don't earn it??? The last update on their website is dated Nov. 19th. UNREAL.
Just needed to vent.

Our paper economy is collapsing by the day. You exemplify the problems facing our shrinking middle class, all transparent to the casual observer due to massaged government stats on inflation and jobs along with a falling currency. You are not alone in your struggles.
First Citibank had to get a loan from a foreign firm (at loan-shark rates) to keep the cash flow going and now we have Merrill Lynch doing the same thing. This is just the beginning. Our paper economy is crumbling...

 

[SegmentKing]

wow... I just hired a gal and she qualified for $15 / hour *STARTING* pay. I also hired a gal with NO experience to work cross utilized ramp/counter for $10.25 an hour... I can't believe i work for a tiny lil airline that pays a heck of a lot more than US....

 

[lithuanian]

We have be Brought down too long! Not only the airlines but every group in America. We can't wait for someone who works for corporate america. We need someone to get on and CHALLENGE the results of corporate GREED!. Sorry to say, but the only person that understands CORPORATE GREED is someone who has represented them! We won't get anywhere till someone realizes we are PAWNS used by the rich.
Time to vote for a difference. Our merge before the change of presidency will only create more problems. Go! for a real change. Go! for a lawyer that sees behind corporate greed and doesn't want to play that game again. Go! for John Edwards. Family man, daughter going for to become a lawyer also. Had his wife with cancer, knows insurance. And, read! He is going after corporate greed. That is where we have come and are at the quagmire!

 

[necigrad]

Wow, must be nice to only need to work 5 hours a check. You fail to account for the fact that some of those deductions, like your union dues, are a flat rate and don't change regardless of if you work 5 hours a week or 50. Only taxes change.

Now, I'm not saying your wrong. US Airways hires what they can cheap. They won't raise pay unless they HAVE to.

 

[wasone]

We have be Brought down too long! Not only the airlines but every group in America. We can't wait for someone who works for corporate america. We need someone to get on and CHALLENGE the results of corporate GREED!. Sorry to say, but the only person that understands CORPORATE GREED is someone who has represented them! We won't get anywhere till someone realizes we are PAWNS used by the rich.
Time to vote for a difference. Our merge before the change of presidency will only create more problems. Go! for a real change. Go! for a lawyer that sees behind corporate greed and doesn't want to play that game again. Go! for John Edwards. Family man, daughter going for to become a lawyer also. Had his wife with cancer, knows insurance. And, read! He is going after corporate greed. That is where we have come and are at the quagmire!

EXCUSE Me, Are we talking about the same john edwards from that small north carolina town called robbins. He didn't even carry his own home town in the elections. You need to do a little more research on the great lawyers business investments.

 

[freedom]

yea i can relate to the poverty ..... :down:


Nation’s Wealthy Cruelly Deprived Of True Meaning Of Christmas

 

[Atlantic]

Your man John gets 400.00 hair cuts. Do you think he knows what a gallon of milk cost these days?
As far as the airlines go, it's a shake out of de-regulation aka 1978. Carter and his egeheads. Made a train wreck out of us. Now everybody is unhappy. Wonder why.

 

[gaucho99]

Well, $18 per hour is not bad pay. Why don't you go full time? Your post wasn't clear if that is an option for you, but I imagine it is. Then you could work OT for $27 per hour....it adds up.

 

[cynic]

Get a smaller car or find a cheaper hair salon. I could do both of those things and still be on the plus side.

Edwards made his money as an ambulance chaser, suing doctors who saved lives.

 

[700UW]

No he did not sue Dr's who saved lives, who sued Dr's who made mistakes and caused injuries and death.

 

[dariencc]

No he did not sue Dr's who saved lives, who sued Dr's who made mistakes and caused injuries and death.

Most of the time your "expert on everything" posing is merely humorous. In this case, it is vulgar.

John Edwards, with his unctuous delivery and utter lack of conscience, made a fortune suing OB/GYNs for "malpractice" in cases of children born with cerebral palsy. He was able to convince idiot juries, consisting of morons, that the doctors who have devoted their lives to the care of women and their newborns were responsible for this devastating condition.

Why don't you do some research on the subject, 700UW? You will find that ALL recent studies have found that delivery is virtually a non factor in such cases. The consensus is that the condition is almost always genetic. Has your hero Edwards offered to give the money back to the doctors who were unfairly maligned? Didn't think so.

Has Edwards and the rest of his sleaze bag malpractice attorneys apologized for the lack of available OB/GYNs in many rural areas where they practiced? Didn't think so either.

One can only imagine your reaction if the public was able to sue aircraft mechanics for delays and cancellations caused by professional "malpractice." The John Edwards of the world would be all over that one, and I can only imagine your simpering response to such "injustice." Your pathetic pleas for protection for the underappreciated mechanics of this country would be cringe inducing, to say the least.

What a jackass.


By the way, any comment on the brewing scandal involving the one candidate who posts his wife front and center as the attack dog of his campaign?

 

[700UW]

After law school, he clerked for a Federal judge and in 1978 became an associate at the Nashville law firm of Dearborn & Ewing, doing primarily trial work, defending a Nashville bank and other corporate clients. The Edwards family returned to North Carolina in 1981, settling in the capital of Raleigh where he joined the firm of Tharrington, Smith & Hargrove.[11]

In 1984 Edwards was assigned to a perceived unwinnable medical malpractice lawsuit; the firm had only accepted it as a favor to an attorney and state senator who did not want to keep it. Nevertheless, Edwards won a $3.7 million verdict on behalf of his client, who suffered permanent brain and nerve damage after a doctor prescribed a drug overdose of anti-alcoholism drug Antabuse during alcohol aversion therapy.[12] In other cases, Edwards sued the American Red Cross three times, alleging transmission of AIDS through tainted blood products, resulting in a confidential settlement each time, and defended a North Carolina newspaper against a libel charge.[11]

In 1985, Edwards represented a five-year-old child born with cerebral palsy whose doctor did not choose to perform an immediate Caesarian delivery when a fetal monitor showed she was in distress. Edwards won a $6.5 million verdict for his client, but five weeks later, the presiding judge sustained the verdict but overturned the award on grounds that it was "excessive" and that it appeared "to have been given under the influence of passion and prejudice," adding that in his opinion "the evidence was insufficient to support the verdict." He offered the plaintiffs half of the jury's award, but the child's family appealed the case and settled for $4.25 million.[11] Winning this case established the North Carolina precedent of physician and hospital liability for failing to determine if the patient understood risks of a particular procedure.[12]

After this trial, Edwards gained national attention as a plaintiff's lawyer. He filed at least twenty similar lawsuits in the years following and achieved verdicts and settlements of more than $60 million for his clients. These successful lawsuits were followed by similar ones across the country. When asked about an increase in Caesarean deliveries nationwide, perhaps to avoid similar medical malpractice lawsuits, Edwards said, "The question is, would you rather have cases where that happens instead of having cases where you don't intervene and a child either becomes disabled for life or dies in utero?"[11]

In 1993, Edwards began his own firm in Raleigh (now known as Kirby & Holt) with a friend, David Kirby. He became known as the top plaintiffs' attorney in North Carolina.[11] The biggest case of his legal career was a 1997 product liability lawsuit against Sta-Rite, the manufacturer of a defective pool drain cover. The case involved a three-year-old girl[13] who was disemboweled by the suction power of the pool drain pump when she sat on an open pool drain whose protective cover other children at the pool had removed, after the swim club had failed to install the cover properly. Despite 12 prior suits with similar claims, Sta-Rite continued to make and sell drain covers lacking warnings. Sta-Rite protested that an additional warning would have made no difference because the pool owners already knew the importance of keeping the cover secured.

In his closing arguments, Edwards spoke to the jury for an hour and a half and referenced his son, Wade, who had been killed shortly before testimony began. Mark Dayton, editor of North Carolina Lawyers Weekly, would later call it "the most impressive legal performance I have ever seen."[14] The jury awarded the family $25 million, the largest personal injury award in North Carolina history. The company settled for the $25 million while the jury was deliberating additional punitive damages, rather than risk losing an appeal. For their part in this case, Edwards and law partner David Kirby earned the Association of Trial Lawyers of America's national award for public service.[12] The family said that they hired Edwards over other attorneys because he alone had offered to accept a smaller percentage as fee unless the award was unexpectedly high, while all of the other lawyers they spoke with said they required the full one-third fee. The size of the jury award was unprecedented, and Edwards did receive the standard one-third plus expenses fee typical of contingency cases. The family was so impressed with his intelligence and commitment[11] that they volunteered for his Senate campaign the next year.

After Edwards won a large verdict against a trucking company whose worker had been involved in a fatal accident, the North Carolina legislature passed a law prohibiting such awards unless the employee's actions had been specifically sanctioned by the company.[11]

 

[Bear96]

This is a TRUE STORY. 30 years seniority with USairways, as a CSA. Started with Allegheny back in the 70's. Still part time since 9-11. Work a 5 hr shift at $18 an hr.

You mean working part time at a relatively low-skilled job doesn't provide a lavish lifestyle?

I am shocked.