$17,000/yr From Each F/A?

[TWAFA007]

Aloha,
Carty has said that he wants the F/As to give AA $340 million per year in PERMMANENT pay cuts. If there are 20,000 AA F/As thats $17,000 each. Considering that the starting salary of an AA F/A is a little over $20,000, how are they going to do this?
ALOHA, 007

 

[FA Mikey]

Work rules are the wrong thing to give up. You will never get them back. Medical benefits also the wrong thing to cut.

 

[MiAAmi]

Its called work rules, vacation days, paid holidays, galley pay, etc etc

 

[Bear96]

Reading the AA board has been fascinating the past couple of weeks.

Some of the posts on this thread, and on others, could have been taken practically verbatim from the US board 10 months ago and the UA board six months ago.

AA's actions lately should be a huge warning sign to those that have been paying attention to US and UA. For example, having an independent company taking over managing 401(k) accounts with company stock in them, and restricting more purchases of company stock, was done at both US and UA in the weeks leading up to their Ch. 11 filings.

Good luck y'all at AA...

 

[SANman]

Forgetting the fact that it would make a lot more sense to cut a percentage from everyone rather than a flat dollar figure for everyone, the math is a little off. Three are 25000 FAs, so the cut is $13600 on average. And the average FA makes $52000/yr in wages and benefits. Besides, as MiAAmi said, this is most likely to come in work rules, not cash.

 

[SANman]

[blockquote]
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On 2/6/2003 11:07:55 AM TWAFA007 wrote:

Aloha SANman,

Using your numbers Carty is asking for more than a 26% cut. Thats a little more than the pay freeze he asked for last month.

I agree with Mike, having been down this road before. Once you start to go down this slippery slide there is no stoppin it. I for one will not vote for any cuts. There are plenty of other areas that AA has to cut waste. How many board members & VPs does AMR have? For one.

ALOHA, 007


----------------
[/blockquote]

007 -

I think it's still 26%, no? $13600 / $52000?

However you look at it, the cut has to come either in productivity or salary. The work rules are just flat out uncompetitive. Pilot and F/A productivity are the 2nd worst in the industry (UA being last). I don't have F/A actual numbers, but the pilots work on average FORTY percent less then WN (39 hrs vs 62 in 2001).

I don't begrudge anyone their salary, but there is no way the airline can survive paying 40% more people than another carrier. If you want the salary, then the productivity must increase; of course that means fewer pilots and F/As. That's a very tough choice to make.

 

[SANman]

Forgot to comment on the mgmt piece.... I wholeheartedly agree that there are additional areas to cut waste, but you simply can't get even close to the needed cuts without changing the labor structure. The Dallas Morning News article (same place the F/A info came from) says that management costs $800 MM a year in wages/benefits - that's about $65000 per head, including the execs. That's also YE 2002 figures, before all of the headcount reduction was in place.

If they're already down 22% in headcount, how much more fat can you realistically expect to trim? It won't make much of a dent in the $6.3 billion in unionized labor expense. Remember, they've already cut $2 B in expenses before this request, which is more than can be said for UA/US when they went down this path...

 

[TWAFA007]

[blockquote]
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On 2/6/2003 10:28:42 AM SANman wrote:

Forgetting the fact that it would make a lot more sense to cut a percentage from everyone rather than a flat dollar figure for everyone, the math is a little off. Three are 25000 FAs, so the cut is $13600 on average. And the average FA makes $52000/yr in wages and benefits. Besides, as MiAAmi said, this is most likely to come in work rules, not cash.
----------------
[/blockquote]
Aloha SANman,

Using your numbers Carty is asking for more than a 26% cut. Thats a little more than the pay freeze he asked for last month.

I agree with Mike, having been down this road before. Once you start to go down this slippery slide there is no stoppin it. I for one will not vote for any cuts. There are plenty of other areas that AA has to cut waste. How many board members & VPs does AMR have? For one.

ALOHA, 007

 

[Oliver Stone''s Apprentice]

FA007 asked how many board members & VPs AMR has. The number of board members for most corporations runs between 11 to 15, and have an odd number so voting isn't deadlocked...

Last time I checked, AA had 43 officers (VP thru CEO). This is pretty much comparable with what UA and US have.

WN has 28 officers (VP thru CEO).

 

[Oliver Stone''s Apprentice]

Someone told me yesterday that there are about 2500 flight attendants on overage leave right now.

If you assume $5K per year for health and retirement per employee, that's $12.5M per year being spent to avoid layoffs.

 

[s80dude]

SanMan, I am not so sure about the 22% reduction, at least in Flight Service. We are still very Management heavy at the DFW base. We still have the same number of FSMs here, just given the furloughs of probationaries and the OLs, a lot less active line flight attendants.

I'm sure the unions will be asking for hard numbers and figures of the #s of management positions that have been cut.

 

[Bear96]

[blockquote]
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On 2/6/2003 552 PM Winglet wrote:

...I'll take my chances with the BK judge. It certainly couldn't be any worse.
----------------
[/blockquote]

MORE verbatim quotes that could have been said by US or UA employees a couple of months ago! This is absolutely fascinating stuff.

Has NO ONE at AA been paying attention to the situation at US or UA over the past year?

Winglet I suggest you speak to some UAL/IAM members, who had the same attitude of "Let the judge decide."

Well, the IAM didn't have the guts to make the tough choices themselves, so the judge DID decide. And y'know what? He decided on a 14% paycut for all IAM crafts at UA.

And that will be only the beginning.

Amazing.

 

[Winglet]

With workrule changes, they want the AFPA to vote to furlough their own members . . . . just like the rest of the unions.

Looking more and more like management wants to take the company in BK with offers like this. I'll take my chances with the BK judge. It certainly couldn't be any worse.

 

[AAquila]

[blockquote]
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On 2/6/2003 10:46:14 AM FA Mikey wrote:

Work rules are the wrong thing to give up. You will never get them back. ----------------
[/blockquote]

Yes, work rules changes like asking the passenger to hand back the headphones, or 'God forbid ,' ask the passengers to pass up any newspapers and related trash to the aisle for pickup.

Headphones cost the company hundreds of thousands $$$ yearly, that plus any trash removal assists in quicker turn times translating into better use of the a/c and more profits for AMR.

Anymore suggestions?

 

[NewHampshire Black Bears]

(Don't ask me how "exactly" it will be done), But I really think A/E will be melded in with AA, to become 1 carrier.
Seeing we're talking about "top heavy" management #'s ($$$), just think for a moment , how much "scratch" could be saved by eliminating "duplicate" management ??

NH/BB's