Something to chew on :
The LOA93 loss basically puts us back where we were in the early part of 2009. In my opinion, USAPA knew the "snapback" argument wouldn't fly from the very start, but pursued it anyway as a way to buy time to pacify its membership and in the hope that the West would go away. The West didn't go away, but other than that the tactic has been wildly successful, buying USAPA almost 3 extra years.
What makes today so different is that USAPA is not any closer to a joint contract now than it was in 2009. In fact, thanks to the illegal job action and the resulting injunction it appears that we are further away from a contract than ever.
The East now knows for sure that the price to pay for separate operations is LOA93. Unless the East pilots and USAPA decide to embrace the Nic, this will be quite a while. Judge Silver's decision will be rendered by April/May 2012 (unless she decides to "pull a Kasher"). As we know, the Appeal to the Ninth Circuit will take about a year. So that will take us to the middle of 2013. Add another nine months for finishing up a contract and voting on it (which considering the speed of negotiations over the last four years seems charitable for USAPA) and the earliest we will see a contract (Nic or otherwise) is early/middle 2014.
That's almost three more years of LOA93. East Age 65 Attrition during that time: 162 total for 2012/2013 and about 18/month for 2014. (Of course, those few East pilots that get to upgrade would still make less in the left seat than Captains at Horizon and Republic and F/Os at DAL and CAL).Maybe some people will take a early retirement, or try to medical out / use up their sick bank, but the last option got a little bit more difficult thanks to the injunction.
The fight to avoid the Nic has been extremely expensive for the East, and the cost will only increase in the years to come, while the chance of success is rapidly declining. So no dancing in the streets for me because of this news, just the hope that maybe some East pilots will see their crusade against the Nic for the fool's errand that it is.
There are about 3800 MIGs. About 1050 of those are West pilots. If an industry standard contract with the Nic was negotiated (and that poor excuse of a "comprehensive proposal" USAPA submitted doesn't qualify as such), and assuming 100% turnout, 1901 "yes" votes would be needed. So if 950 West pilots would vote "yes", 951 out of 2750 East pilots would need to vote "yes" (34.5%). I'd say that's do-able but I doubt that the BPR will allow the NAC to negotiate such a contract, because apparently "Majority Rules" only applies when the East is trying to force a new union on the West.
BTW, Arbitrator Kasher announced his decision in early November. Since then, we've had Cleary publicly proffer mediation, a distinct change in litigative strategy and the resignation of several USAPA "back of the van" members (Kubic / Theuer) and a PHL rep. Coincidence? You decide.
