When the company proposes to give the TWU the paid premiums plus the match to take over the retirement medical, a 4 million pound rated chain wont stop the International from jumping on it. And given the alternative of 49 and younger losing theirs in the T/A, I suspect they will be pleased too. Question of the day would be, what happens to that money if Socialized Medicine is impletmented full tilt and we don't need the retirement medical?
My guess is the hiring will start soon after ratification and an early out retirement incentive will be upon us. This will quickly reduce the cost of the proposed pay and benefits increases. 2400 is probably the number that management expects to leave. And 2400 not being paid those pay and benefits reduces the cost substantially.
These rumors came from management early last week after they attended an "informational" meeting about negotiations. More than one in management from different areas claimed the same thing within the same day.
I think someone with some brains entered the nest of stupid and a plan was devised and costed out, and you will soon see it yourself. They just don't want you and your TWU Cronies to get credit for it so they leaked it out.
Or perhaps management was leaking out "info" to see how it was recieved. I dont see them offering an early out for the line where they are short and there isnt a ready supply waiting to come in and replace the guys we had, they didnt offer our guys the VBR either. When I asked why our guys couldnt get it, over a year ago I was told "we cant afford to lose our line guys", they later stated they expect to lose 400 to 500 a year. The FAA only gets around 3000 new A&Ps a year coming into the Aviation industry. That covers everyone, from the pilot who gets his A&P so he can run an air Taxi service like the one that Senator Steven died in to the guys at Boeing, to the guys working on crop dusters to the guys working Helicopters to the guys at FBO s and of course the airlines. The FAA figures there are around 300,000 A&Ps out there and the numbers they are issueing come out to around 1% while on average. If you figure that the carreer of an A&P at the very high end is 52 years (age 18 to 70) that means they would need around 6000 a year simply for attrition, a more realistic range would be from 25 to 60, then they would need an average of 8500/year. Thats assuming no growth in the industry and that everyone who gets their license actually chooses to go into the industry, which isnt very likely, it wasnt that likely 30 years ago when I went to A&P schoool and its even less likely today. If I look at the 100 or so that graduated with me in 1980 only around 10% continue to work in the industry today.
Socialized Medicine is looking less and less likely and as long as people continue to believe all the lies the Insurance companies put out about it and elect politicains(who get their medical coverage from the government) who side with the Insurance companies.
While I can only speak for myself, I dont think the sub-committee would be too responsive to a TWU controlled health insurance plan, after all when we look at the company we see an organization that has reduced its debt, cut its workforce by 50,000 and actually increased revenues, whereas the TWU has seen its assetts halved, membership and revenue decline over that same period. Only one member of the sub-committee is from the International and he would have to convince three of us that its a good deal. If it got brought back to the full committee it may be different but then again I dont think the membership would be too receptive to the idea.
Right now the company is having trouble retaining workers in the high cost areas, we have middle aged workers, the ones who are usually considered at the prime of productivity and the least likely to quit, quit and go into other endeavors, I've never seen anything like this before, sure its a only a trickle but we are in a recession with 15 million unemployed and we have people quitting! What do you think it will be like when the economy recovers? Obviously they are losing their most motivated workers now, what will they be left with when the economy recovers and better jobs are even easier to find?
