USA320Pilot said:
The reason the contracts are so bad is because of union resistance to face reality.
If you’re upset, be upset at the union process...
Regards,
USA320Pilot
[post="258603"][/post]
Well, USA320Pilot, you’re half-right here. I believe specifically the IAM, and I suspect most of the other Union groups, should be mad at the Union process, but not for the reasons you believe.
The reason most of the people I know are mad is because the management changed from a clueless "soft management" team, into a predatory "hard management" regime. (See the thread and
Article here). Without Unions, the management could have just announced lower wages and less labor friendly working conditions. The employees who didn't like what happed to their jobs would have no recourse but to quit, and find another job.
Fortunately (or in this case unfortunately), the labor force at US Airways was contracted labor. And with the new predatory "hard management" regime, most of us considered our groups as sub-contractors, so as to not bear any associations with what we considered Evil Conquers of our "lost" company. (Kind of like the Free French of WWII).
As disassociated sub-contractors, we expected our contacts to be honored regardless of any financial hardships the management brought upon themselves by stupid, greedy, and corrupt business decisions. We expected the management to change its' wrong, unprofitable, business policies and run a profitable business. The management made it clear that any facts or suggestions from "the sub-contractors" were not appreciated, and were in fact a nuisance to them. Fine. Run your own company. Just honor your obligations.
The management then exacerbated the relationship with the IAM by unilaterally breaking a fundamental clause of their contract. The IAM did the proper thing and took the "evil conquers" to court, and won.
The management then used fear, uncertainty, and doubt to intimidate certain of their "sub-contractors" into revising their contracts to favor the "company". When other groups resisted, the management used the leverage of the bankruptcy courts to push the remaining "sub-contractors" into untenable positions.
Once in an untenable position, I believe it was the duty of the Union Leadership to lobby for further rejection of any contract concessions and for the withdrawal of its' memberships services. From what I understand, this is exactly the position favored by the I.A.M. International, and they were prepared to endure any consequences brought about by such a stand and subsequent actions. Unfortunately the rank and file were not.
Now we get to the reason why I believe the Union’s memberships should be angry with their Unions leadership.
I believe that it is the responsibility of the Union Leadership to not only educate their membership to the harshness of business practices and negotiations, but to also be strong leaders in each, individual, campaign in this new "predatory to labor" environment.
I believe that even if the rank and file was fearful of taking on the management, the Union leadership should have deployed organizers to rally the membership into doing the right thing. The concession stand should have stayed closed.