Trouble Ahead

[LaBradford22]

:down:



mweiss, you'ved got to be out of your ever-loving mind!



It's obvious you have NOT done the math. A 17% raise over 6.5 years is a raise of only 2.6153846% (and so on) per year! Inflation is about 3% per year!

Southwest Airlines has $1,800,000,000.00 in HARD, COLD, CASH, on hand; IN THE BANK!!!

If asking for a pay raise that is More than what Flight Attendants made in 1986 and is MORE than inflation will kill the "Golden Goose"; than by golly, at this point I am ready, willing, and able to do so!

Obviously economics and finance are not your strong suite; as the $1.8 billion dollars in the bank will absolutely be way more than enough to keep from killing the goose. And, we are continuing to make money each and every quarter. And, after all; labor expenses are a part of the "cost of doing business"; which absolutely should financially be accounted for in the business model.

If the business model does not account for labor costs; then it needs to be changed as soon as practically possible!

I'm sorry if you and your family's skills, work, and future is worth equal to, or less than the cost of inflation; but MY SKILLS, WORK, AND EXPERIENCE NEVER WILL BE!

I refuse to be financially devalued or demeaned in this contract; as I know how top-notch an employee I am. And, I know the value I add to each and every flight; in order to keep my fine and worthy customers coming back to see me and Southwest Airlines.

I refuse to offer up the same value of service to my customers; that Southwest Airlines is offering up to their internal customers, ME!

Rant temporarily ended.


:rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant:

It's obvious you have NOT done the math. A 17% raise over 6.5 years is a raise of only 2.6153846% (and so on) per year! Inflation is about 3% per year!

Not sure where the 3% inflation figure comes from. Long-term, steady-state, we can argue about what inflation works out to, but in recent years, inflation has definitely been much less than 3%. A raise of 2.6% per year is not going to make you rich, but keep in mind that there are others in your profession that have taken double-digit pay cuts in the last couple of years. I'm sure those folks would trade places with you in a heartbeat.

Obviously economics and finance are not your strong suite; as the $1.8 billion dollars in the bank will absolutely be way more than enough to keep from killing the goose. And, we are continuing to make money each and every quarter. And, after all; labor expenses are a part of the "cost of doing business"; which absolutely should financially be accounted for in the business model.

If the business model does not account for labor costs; then it needs to be changed as soon as practically possible!

Yes, but that $1.8B in the bank also has to cover a lot of other things. Wages and benefits for all other workgroups. Fuel. Aircraft costs. Debt payments. Landing fees. Airport facility rent. Etc, etc, etc. It's not as if the company has $1.8B in the bank that it could just hand over to the flight attendants if only the darn company weren't too stingy to do so.

And as far as changing the business model goes, I'm not sure where that comes from. You may not have noticed, but the Southwest model is the only model that has remained profitable through industry ups and downs, through 9/11, through the fall-out in full-fare business travel, through the tech bubble bursting, through the Iraq War, through the impact of SARS, through higher fuel prices, etc, etc, etc. What's ironic is that I've seen work groups at many other airlines complain that their management has not yet tried to adopt the Southwest model.

I refuse to be financially devalued or demeaned in this contract; as I know how top-notch an employee I am. And, I know the value I add to each and every flight; in order to keep my fine and worthy customers coming back to see me and Southwest Airlines.

If you are as passionate about serving customers as you are about contractual issues (and I suspect you are), then you are truly a top-notch employee. Quite honestly, in the best of all possible worlds, top-notch employees would be rewarded as such (with top-notch salaries, faster track promotions, bonuses and other perks, etc) while lazy employees that do a half-assed job would be likewise punished. Alas, ours is not a perfect world. Your value as an employee (at least, your financial value) is wrapped up and objectively defined by your seniority. The contract is not ascribing value to you personally, it is ascribing value to your whole group of however many thousand employees. So, if you're in the top 1% of all employees, you probably deserve a big raise - say, 20%. The problem is that the company can't give you a 20% raise because if it did, it would have to give every other employee in your workgroup a 20% raise, and the vast majority of them aren't worth that much.

I hate to sound insensitive, but that's the way the world works in this crazy industry of ours... <_<

 

[mweiss]

txskygal, you've got to calm down here a second.

First of all, economics is, in fact, one of my strong suits. So is corporate strategy, which takes into account far more than simple economics.

Raises due to seniority are sensible, because your value to the company increases over time. As I've noted elsewhere around here, that wage increase should reflect the increased value to the company, but not to excessive levels.

Raises due to inflation are reasonable for a company whose per-unit income has risen at or above the inflation rate. But inflation is nowhere near 3% per year right now. If you look here, you'll see that it is, in fact, 1.2%.

Raises due to increased productivity of the group as a whole is reasonable, provided the raise does not exceed productivity improvements.

So what's your argument again for having a raise double the rate of inflation?

 

[7.5victim]

Why should my pay raise be less than the cost of inflation?

Simple answer.... Airfares certainly haven't kept up with inflation! How do you propose getting a raise to be paid by money that isn't there? Many of us in this industry are working for less these days. Front end or back, most of us at other carriers would be very happy with a 17% raise. Ask anyone at UA, AA, or US just how much they've taken in cuts!

 

[wnfan37]

How many f/a's at SW? How long do you think it takes for training? Besides AA tried this about 10 yrs ago, they failed.

I think swa could weather a strike or shutdown ok.. almost $2B in the bank doesn't hurt, thousands of flight attendants looking to fly again, and AA was certainly (and will never be) not SWA. should be interesting - grab some popcorn.

a strike or lock-out doesn't help anyone... but hey, if swa shuts down for some "house cleaning" they can certainly attract flyers back with newly hired junior employees (thus lower labor cost) and fares at $19.00. shame that thom mcdaniel and the rest of the twu leadership have their own interests in mind - maybe the rest of the f/a work group should wake up and smell the peanuts.

 

[7.5victim]

Who said anything about a strike. IMHO, the company will lock out the FA's before they can have a chance to strike.

Maybe you should study the railway labor act a little more. Once the impasse has been declared by the NMB, the 30 day clock will start. At the end of the cooling off period, the company can impose "self help", and the union can strike. WN mgmt would likely make their current offer the new work rules. If the union members don't like it, they can strike. The company has more options than just a lock out.

 

[wwtraveler99]

Unless, they're going to get several thousand flight attendants trained and certified in time for a strike, that is going to get tough.

If I am correct, if not it's close, it takes about 4 weeks for a new F/A to be trained. So when an impasse is declared Southwest will mass hire and train these people. Remember there is a 30 day (approx 4 weeks) cooling off period. Now also take into account all those on probation and the percentage of those who will not walk and I see very small and short term disruption. I do how that something is settled before this happens but it is not looking good at this point. Also the one thing that bother me is the Unions refusel to send the compnaies "best" contract to the memeber and let them vote. The Union has nothing to lose. If it gets voted donw then they can tell the company "I told you so". If it gets voted in then good for the F/As. The power is in the numbers.

 

[KCFlyer]

Unless, they're going to get several thousand flight attendants trained and certified in time for a strike, that is going to get tough.

If I am correct, if not it's close, it takes about 4 weeks for a new F/A to be trained. So when an impasse is declared Southwest will mass hire and train these people. Remember there is a 30 day (approx 4 weeks) cooling off period. Now also take into account all those on probation and the percentage of those who will not walk and I see very small and short term disruption. I do how that something is settled before this happens but it is not looking good at this point. Also the one thing that bother me is the Unions refusel to send the compnaies "best" contract to the memeber and let them vote. The Union has nothing to lose. If it gets voted donw then they can tell the company "I told you so". If it gets voted in then good for the F/As. The power is in the numbers.

ww...didn't the rampers vote down the first TA that they were presented? I agree...go ahead and "tentatively agree" to the company's offer. If the numbers are behind the union, it would get voted down. At least then, the company would know that the offer wasn't acceptable to their employees, and not have to rely on a guy who is more interested in media attention than contract negotiations.

 

[wwtraveler99]

LaBradford22 said:

Yes, but that $1.8B in the bank also has to cover a lot of other things. Wages and benefits for all other workgroups. Fuel. Aircraft costs. Debt payments. Landing fees. Airport facility rent. Etc, etc, etc. It's not as if the company has $1.8B in the bank that it could just hand over to the flight attendants if only the darn company weren't too stingy to do so.

Now you must know that the 1.8b is not for the items you stated. The money for wages, benefits, aircraft (most) come from revenue generated during the year it was spent. That is why they have a budget. Now any unbudgeted item may be paid for use cash on hand, but they would try and pay them using their cash flow.

 

[wwtraveler99]

kcflyer,

You are correct sir. The Ramp and Operations people did vote the contract down the fisrt time, 2 contract ago though. The latest contract was a little different. Herb implemented the Companys offer on the pay scales hoping to divide the memebership. It didn't work. The memebership held strong and finally got the contract in place todyay.

 

[wnfan37]

Once the impasse has been declared by the NMB, the 30 day clock will start. At the end of the cooling off period, the company can impose "self help", and the union can strike.

And... let's not forget that there's a sitting Republican President from the great state of Texas - and surprise - the home state of WN. You can count on Presidential intervention to tack on an additional 60-days. Bet on it. You think WN mgmt isn't courting "Dubya?" Plus, in this lousy economy - and with air transportation such a huge part of the economy - he'll most likely step in. So, that gives WN 30-days plus 60 to figure out replacements or whatever.

 

[local 12 proud]

does'nt matter whos sitting in the oval office, demican or republicrat they are the same. president clinton stepped in and prevented the AA pilots from striking by imposing presidential order. labor in this country is in deep doo doo unless things change..........any ideas anyone?

 

[MiAAmi]

And... let's not forget that there's a sitting Republican President from the great state of Texas - and surprise - the home state of WN. You can count on Presidential intervention to tack on an additional 60-days. Bet on it. You think WN mgmt isn't courting "Dubya?" Plus, in this lousy economy - and with air transportation such a huge part of the economy - he'll most likely step in. So, that gives WN 30-days plus 60 to figure out replacements or whatever.

As long as you get to fly for $19 it does really matter to you how the employees are treated does it? The same so called president stepped in with AA in 2001 and the company avoided a strike by caving in and giving us what we wanted. AA is HDQ'd in Texas too!

 

[wnbubbleboy]

And what? Shut the airline down for weeks? Yea right!

Many of us are under contract and will show up for work. Shutting down is not an option. With that being said here's my opinion of what I saw at the recent BWI message to the field. Flight attendants you show up united at the BWI message to the field with red shirts on and stay in your seats while whe all stood for Collen and Jim. Which Jim I can understand since you are going through with the impasss/deadlock whatever. Staying in your seat for Collen though? She's the reason Southwest is people oriented and why we are different from brand X airlines. Also, after that people in you group happily hop skip and jump to get the gifts the company is handing out. Did you notice your group was the only on cheering? Do you see the how this looks to other work groups? There is some hypocracy of you actions. You have an ax to grind but accept prises regardless. I know you work hard, we all do. We all carry crosses to make this company successfull. You have to remember there are other work groups watching. After this all passes, and it will, remember many of us will be left with the impression of a spoiled kid crying because their piece of cake is smaller that their kid brothers.

 

[airlineorphan]

Southwest, having the highest rate of profit in the industry, can afford a significant raise for f/a's. And the rest of us who actually do the work in the industry should back them up. Southwest f/a's will set the standard for the rest of us in their current struggle.

Keep up the fight, you are an inspiration to many of us!

In solidarity,
Airlineorphan

 

[txskygal]

Many of us are under contract and will show up for work. Shutting down is not an option. With that being said here's my opinion of what I saw at the recent BWI message to the field. Flight attendants you show up united at the BWI message to the field with red shirts on and stay in your seats while whe all stood for Collen and Jim. Which Jim I can understand since you are going through with the impasss/deadlock whatever. Staying in your seat for Collen though? She's the reason Southwest is people oriented and why we are different from brand X airlines. Also, after that people in you group happily hop skip and jump to get the gifts the company is handing out. Did you notice your group was the only on cheering? Do you see the how this looks to other work groups? There is some hypocracy of you actions. You have an ax to grind but accept prises regardless. I know you work hard, we all do. We all carry crosses to make this company successfull. You have to remember there are other work groups watching. After this all passes, and it will, remember many of us will be left with the impression of a spoiled kid crying because their piece of cake is smaller that their kid brothers.




Why should they not accept the prizes? And, REALISTICALLY, why should their piece of cake be smaller than the others?

TIA