TWU negotiations.........what?

[Vortilon]

Nope never said that. I said that we would be working from $37 not $33 and hour on pay. So number two to number eight. Nice Bob, where's that money on the table? Oh it's going to everyone but us.

Yes, but they were given an option and they opted out. Their deal was that once ratified they had the option of staying in the old plan. Guess, what? They all took their pre-funding money. It was their option, not forced on them.

The matching funds are there if you use the plan. The money in the fund is still used for retiree medical insurance for those who stay in the plan. AA does not get to use it for other things. It's illegal to use the money for other then what it was intended. You were told this by Rosen yet you still don't tell the truth.

The plan to use sick credits is the same one in use at WN and CO the contracts you idolize.

I read the deal and all the other contracts, it is quite obvious you may have read it, you just ignored that the agreement must be taken in its totality. NOt cherry picked.

Bob, you are wrong.Man up. The TA was a better deal than you told everyone, AA went to BK even though you said it was a bluff, and yes our work can be outsourced. But you will be safe in JFK while 4,000 plus M&R walk out the door. Either way, Bob you will be fine doing your amateur hour videos with Chuck tell bedtime stories about the money that's on the table and soaking up your local 562 salary on top of your UBP. Here's to you Mister Promise You Everything Union President, your one of the Bud Light Real Men of Genius.

Funny how comfortable you seem trying to blame Bob for all your tales of woe. Last time I checked, people on your side of the TA argument were out voted by a large margin. Not only that, but a very high percentage of eligible voters participated. Most couldn't tell you who Bob Owens is, let alone what impact his opinion had on their decision for the TA vote. You are damn sure in the minority here at DFW.

 

[Overspeed]

I agree they have an unsustainable cost structure, I just dont agree that we are part of the problem or the solution. Maybe now that they are shedding leases on aircraft they dont use and if they curtail a lot of waste they will, but cutting our benefits and wages, again, is not going to get them there.

And the motion is to abrogate the contract, which if granted would allow the company to impose new terms as negotiations continue, under section 6. It would be as if we were non-union negotiating our first contract. Not the end of the world.

You're right, I cant, because I'm not a corporation but corporations can. Ask a lawyer if there is a means test for a company to file bankruptcy. I did.


So you are saying that we should subsidize managements shortcomings by agreeing to continue to give concessions until they can figure out how to run the company? Why would the shareholders ever hold them accountable if they have convinced us to work for less?

Bob, you could have been part of the solution but you and several of your buddies told Arpey to pound sand and no working together. So you got what you wanted, they aren't working together, they are working against you and they have all the leverage. Good move Bob, well played.

Your right, working without a contract is not so bad. They can say, slam us on the BC JFK? Okay we'll outsource that.

Yes there is a test, and just because you want to file BK doesn't mean you can get all your debts or CBAs abrogated.

Shareholders will hold them accountable. They want blood, our blood. If AA outsourced more the cost structure would be lower and more attractive to sell off in pieces. Then we could lose all our jobs and be at top pay like you predicted in 2018. Awesome Bob! You thought this whole thing out.

 

[Overspeed]

So AA owes $32.3 billion in total. Is it due right this instant? How much of that obligation isnt due for years down the road? AA also has $24 billion a year in revenue and the people who extended AA all that credit dont seem too concerned about AA's ability to pay.How much of that $32.3 billion is related to the deal they cut last summer to buy 500 airplanes? Wont nearly all that additional liability dissapear once AA cuts those deals where they sell the planes they just bought to a lessor?

The planes are collateralized debt. They can be repossessed, you are just possessed. The point about the debt argument is that the debt must be serviced and the revenue doesn't cover operating costs plus servicing the debt. You are a regular finance expert I see.

 

[Overspeed]

Funny how comfortable you seem trying to blame Bob for all your tales of woe. Last time I checked, people on your side of the TA argument were out voted by a large margin. Not only that, but a very high percentage of eligible voters participated. Most couldn't tell you who Bob Owens is, let alone what impact his opinion had on their decision for the TA vote. You are damn sure in the minority here at DFW.

You soaking up all that OT? Somebody is. Minority? Try silent majority. When the loud mouths leave with the break room rhetoric, the real meaningful discussions start. Most would vote yes now.

I don't blame Bob. I am engaging in thoughtful spirited discussion with him. So far all his beliefs have been proven wrong and the whole BK process has just started. Will he ever admit he was wrong unless his goal was to thin the pool of AMTs so he could ask for more later. Were those even his jobs to gamble with? I guess they were since he is still sitting at the table and trying to extend the process beyond BK. Maybe he can get a deal with Geo Pay now that all those pesky overhaul jobs have been cut.

Yep, some people are going to die on their feet but we that stay will be getting Geo Pay...maybe. So we gave up retiree medical, the pension, and $37 and hour for Geo Pay or whatever else Bob would like to get in JFK. Awesome.

 

[Buck]

Tulsa will get Geo Pay, only it will be 0.00 indexed.

 

[Hopeful]

I don't know why these conversations of line vs. overhaul, OSM in exchange for Title II jobs, etc., etc., etc. are continuing. All the "I HEARD's" and "MY UNION REP TOLD US" and the general rumor mill gossip have not materialized.
If the union did indeed settle on "WE'LL GIVE YOU THIS IN EXCHANGE FOR THAT," and the company agreed, there would've been a consenual agreement by now.
I would say that even though they claim they are still negotiationg, negotiations have been going nowhere in my opinion. The company is preparing for their day before the judge to abrogate the contracts and they are preparing for the unions' arguments.
The company has made it clear what they want in respect to their "ASK" and the term sheets. If the judge abrogates, the term sheets are what will be imposed.

When the fat lady has sung, you will see, sadly enough, that the company got just about everything they want. From all the unions.

I understand the purpose of this forum which is basically a discussion outlet.
But until you see on paper what is to be, rumors and gossip will continue to be just that......rumors and gossip.

One thing is for sure.....Bankruptcy will have proven to be far worse than any rejected TA.

 

[Bob Owens]

Bob, you could have been part of the solution but you and several of your buddies told Arpey to pound sand and no working together. So you got what you wanted, they aren't working together, they are working against you and they have all the leverage. Good move Bob, well played.

Your right, working without a contract is not so bad. They can say, slam us on the BC JFK? Okay we'll outsource that.

Yes there is a test, and just because you want to file BK doesn't mean you can get all your debts or CBAs abrogated.

Shareholders will hold them accountable. They want blood, our blood. If AA outsourced more the cost structure would be lower and more attractive to sell off in pieces. Then we could lose all our jobs and be at top pay like you predicted in 2018. Awesome Bob! You thought this whole thing out.

More spin, I'm not in favor in increasing productivity without any quid pro quo. Kansas City embraced Working Together and where did it get them? Those working together plans went ahead anyway, with the full support of the ATD, they got A-4 passes, we got nothing, when it came time to collect the company said they used it to pay for fuel.

You claim there's "a test" for a company that files C-11, Ok could you reference it? A link, anything or is there simply a test in your head. I cant claim BK when my income is sufficient to cover servicing my debts and meeting my obligations, but AA and other corporations can and did.

I dont doubt that AA could not have continued to spend as they were, pissing money away replacing structures that were structurally sound, paying for space they did not use, aircraft they did not fly, initiating unneccesary programs and other blatently expensive and unneccisary projects, giving managers monies to dump in things such as new refridgerators, microwaves, toughbooks, flat screen TVs, chairs tables, remodelling, landscaping, houses in London, Aprtments in Manhattan and Howard Beach, providing $1 billion to JAL, sponsoring several arenas just so they can have their name said on TV, top heavy management etc etc, but like I said, we are not the problem. Maybe you feel guilty getting paid what you do for what you do but thats you, most of us are willing to work in exchange for a fair days pay.

You claimed that SWA has better work rules, what did you mean by that?

 

[TWU informer]

I don't know why these conversations of line vs. overhaul, OSM in exchange for Title II jobs, etc., etc., etc. are continuing. All the "I HEARD's" and "MY UNION REP TOLD US" and the general rumor mill gossip have not materialized.
If the union did indeed settle on "WE'LL GIVE YOU THIS IN EXCHANGE FOR THAT," and the company agreed, there would've been a consenual agreement by now.

Unless there are some minor other issues that need resolved, and the plan is to actually wait until the last minute, have a membership vote on the companies "last offer", which is really the agreement so as to deflect blame away from the TWU. Never under estimate the TWU's ability to manipulate, lie, and use threats to get what the International wants.

The agreement is already there, now it is the phase of lowering expectations, allow fear to continue to spread, and then have an emergency vote just before the Judge rules. Predictable.

 

[Bob Owens]

You soaking up all that OT? Somebody is. Minority? Try silent majority. When the loud mouths leave with the break room rhetoric, the real meaningful discussions start. Most would vote yes now.

I don't blame Bob. I am engaging in thoughtful spirited discussion with him. So far all his beliefs have been proven wrong and the whole BK process has just started. Will he ever admit he was wrong unless his goal was to thin the pool of AMTs so he could ask for more later. Were those even his jobs to gamble with? I guess they were since he is still sitting at the table and trying to extend the process beyond BK. Maybe he can get a deal with Geo Pay now that all those pesky overhaul jobs have been cut.

Yep, some people are going to die on their feet but we that stay will be getting Geo Pay...maybe. So we gave up retiree medical, the pension, and $37 and hour for Geo Pay or whatever else Bob would like to get in JFK. Awesome.

First off which OH jobs have been cut? The fact is nobody has been laid off yet. In fact they continue to hire, the bottom guy on the Title 1 list was hired St. Patricks Day. Keep making things up to fit your objectives.

The fact is we dont know what will happen down the road and if we continue to base decisions as to what we should ask to get paid based on what the company chooses to show us instead of the going rate we will continue to get screwed. In 1995 the company said everything was doom and gloom, locked us into a concessionary deal for 6 years and went on to make record profits. We only have control over certain things. We can not control how much debt the company chooses to take on, what they pay their executives, how many planes they fly, where they fly them or how much they charge passengers, we can control what we are willing to sell our labor for. Back in 2009 the company claimed that by 2012 that they would run out of work and have to cut 1200 heads, well they still have more work than they can handle and even though they announced they are closing AFW they admit that they wont actually be able to do that for a while. Instead of losing 1200 they hired 500.

Will AA outsource more work? Probably, if it makes sense to do so, but by their actions over the last six years it appears that they increased insourcing, and our contract only stipulates maintaining what we currently do, as long as we have the ability, not capturing work we never did, even then the company has flexibility as we saw with the 757s going to Timco and the Tires and whhel being outsourced and the engines they sent out. The fact is we dont know whether it makes sense or not, apparently the company isnt sure either judging from Arpeys respones a few years back. The reason is because there is no way to find out what AA will pay Timco or AAR and compare it to what SWA or UAL pays. Its not like buying a loaf of bread with the price stamped on it, its more like buying a used car, the price varies based on several factors and the what they pay is subject to confidentiality, or so the company claims. If AA wanted to dump their OH into the market the odds are that they would be paying more than anybody else, especially if capacity is tight. Its fair for the MROs to do this because the cost for them would be different, especially if they had to increase capacity to do the work. They can price the same way the airlines sell seats and gouge a last minute customer. But my question to you is how much are you willing to give up in order to try and keep the current levels of outsourcing? At what point do you have to say lets make the job one worth coming back to? You look at us as if you are selling us as a product, like pork bellies instead of as mechanics with a craft and standards to uphold. If you are selling pork bellies it may be worth it to sell them at a cheaper price and make up for it in volume, but we are selling something more precious than pork bellies, supplied by the unfortunate pigs that get slaugfhtered to provide them, we are selling hours of our lives and our objective should be to maximize the rate we get per hour and not to sell more hours at lower rates. If the unions that are supposed to be the means by which we achieve the objective of maximizing our rates really want to do the right thing they should not treat us like Pork Bellies, they should try and maximize our rates and if some work can nopt be kept in house because the company can send it elsewhere and get it done cheaper then their strategy should be to try and organize thoser places and bring wages up, not bring us down to their wages.

Look at where we are now. Jet Blue and Delta both make more than we do, and that would be the case even if we accepted the 2010 TA. We would continue to have less Paid Time off than either of them, fewer holidays and less sick time. Yes they can outsource whatever they want but both carriers have increased their headcounts over the last four years and increased the amount they do in house, without contracts. You seem to forget all the concessions in the TA and the fact that it was "cost neutral", which in real life is concessionary as long as there is inflation, what they gave in one hand they took with the other. The TA allowed the company to spin off up to 25% of the value of the maintenance operation in any given year, more if who ever purchased it agreed to offer employment to TWU members. So the company could have spun off Tulsa or AFW and let the Union Grieve it. The first question would be "Why did the union agree to this?"

When we entered this industry 30 years ago we knew that it never was a guaranteed paycheck. Even 30 years ago Airlines went Bankrupt, only then they went away. If we keep giving concessions for jobs then we will eventually be paying them to work here, in fact we already are, it started with Prefunding, then Medical. Many of us now pay AA well over $3000 for less than what was once part of our pay.

 

[TWU informer]

Most if not all of us are being tormented by our own minds, yet we choose to blame someone or something else.
There is so much living in the past here, and speculation about the future that we are basically diseased by it all.

Read this...

Enlightenment and the sense of Being

When someone goes to the doctor and says, "I hear a voice in my head," he or she will most likely be sent to a psychiatrist. The fact is that, in a very similar way, virtually everyone hears a voice, or several voices, in their head all the time: the involuntary thought processes that you don't realize you have the power to stop. Continuous monologues or dialogues.

You have probably come across "mad" people in the street incessantly talking or muttering to themselves. Well, that's not much different from what you and all other "normal" people do, except that you don't do it out loud. The voice comments, speculates, judges, compares, complains, likes, dislikes, and so on. The voice isn't necessarily relevant to the situation you find yourself in at the time; it may be reviving the recent or distant past or rehearsing or imagining possible future situations. Here it often imagines things going wrong and negative outcomes; this is called worry. Sometimes this soundtrack is accompanied by visual images or "mental movies." Even if the voice is relevant to the situation at hand, it will interpret it in terms of the past. This is because the voice belongs to your conditioned mind, which is the result of all your past history as well as of the collective cultural mind-set you inherited. So you see and judge the present through the eyes of the past and get a totally distorted view of it. It is not uncommon for the voice to be a person's own worst enemy. Many people live with a tormentor in their head that continuously attacks and punishes them and drains them of vital energy. It is the cause of untold misery and unhappiness, as well as of disease.

The good news is that you can free yourself from your mind. This is the only true liberation. You can take the first step right now. Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can. Pay particular attention to any repetitive thought patterns, those old gramophone records that have been playing in your head perhaps for many years. This is what I mean by "watching the thinker," which is another way of saying: listen to the voice in your head, be there as the witnessing presence.

When you listen to that voice, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. Do not judge or condemn what you hear, for doing so would mean that the same voice has come in again through the back door. You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind.

So when you listen to a thought, you are aware not only of the thought but also of yourself as the witness of the thought. A new dimension of consciousness has come in. As you listen to the thought, you feel a conscious presence - your deeper self - behind or underneath the thought, as it were. The thought then loses its power over you and quickly subsides, because you are no longer energizing the mind through identification with it. This is the beginning of the end of involuntary and compulsive thinking. When a thought subsides, you experience a discontinuity in the mental stream - a gap of "no-mind." At first, the gaps will be short, a few seconds perhaps, but gradually they will become longer. When these gaps occur, you feel a certain stillness and peace inside you. This is the beginning of your natural state of felt oneness with Being, which is usually obscured by the mind. With practice, the sense of stillness and peace will deepen. In fact, there is no end to its depth. You will also feel a subtle emanation of joy arising from deep within: the joy of Being.

It is not a trancelike state. Not at all. There is no loss of consciousness here. The opposite is the case. If the price of peace were a lowering of your consciousness, and the price of stillness a lack of vitality and alertness, then they would not be worth having. In this state of inner connectedness, you are much more alert, more awake than in the mind-identified state. You are fully present. It also raises the vibrational frequency of the energy field that gives life to the physical body.

As you go more deeply into this realm of no-mind, as it is sometimes called in the East, you realize the state of pure consciousness. In that state, you feel your own presence with such intensity and such joy that all thinking, all emotions, your physical body, as well as the whole external world become relatively insignificant in comparison to it. And yet this is not a selfish but a selfless state. It takes you beyond what you previously thought of as "your self." That presence is essentially you and at the same time inconceivably greater than you. What I am trying to convey here may sound paradoxical or even contradictory, but there is no other way that I can express it.

Instead of "watching the thinker," you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the Now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment. This is a deeply satisfying thing to do. In this way, you draw consciousness away from mind activity and create a gap of no-mind in which you are highly alert and aware but not thinking. This is the essence of meditation. In your everyday life, you can practice this by taking any routine activity that normally is only a means to an end and giving it your fullest attention, so that it becomes an end in itself. For example, every time you walk up and down the stairs in your house or place of work, pay close attention to every step, every movement, even your breathing. Be totally present. Or when you wash your hands, pay attention to all the sense perceptions associated with the activity: the sound and feel of the water, the movement of your hands, the scent of the soap, and so on. Or when you get into your car, after you close the door, pause for a few seconds and observe the flow of your breath. Become aware of a silent but powerful sense of presence. There is one certain criterion by which you can measure your success in this practice: the degree of peace that you feel within.

So the single most vital step on your journey toward enlightenment is this: learn to disidentify from your mind. Every time you create a gap in the stream of mind, the light of your consciousness grows stronger. One day you may catch yourself smiling at the voice in your head, as you would smile at the antics of a child. This means that you no longer take the content of your mind all that seriously, as your sense of self does not depend on it. :blush:

 

[Bob Owens]

Unless there are some minor other issues that need resolved, and the plan is to actually wait until the last minute, have a membership vote on the companies "last offer", which is really the agreement so as to deflect blame away from the TWU. Never under estimate the TWU's ability to manipulate, lie, and use threats to get what the International wants.

The agreement is already there, now it is the phase of lowering expectations, allow fear to continue to spread, and then have an emergency vote just before the Judge rules. Predictable.

Cant say I disagree. Like I've said all along, we may have to vote NO more than once, and keep voting NO until we get what we should.
The only thing we can control is how we vote, either YES we accept lowering the bottom or No we dont. They can spin up BK all they want, we could have a deal imposed on us but they can not make us accept it. Even if the contract is abrogated we still continue to negotiate. We are the only group at AA that is at the bottom of the industry, AA is asking all the others to go to the middle, we are at the bottom and they are asking us to make the bottom deeper. This would set a new precedent in BK.

 

[737823]

Cant say I disagree. Like I've said all along, we may have to vote NO more than once, and keep voting NO until we get what we should.
The only thing we can control is how we vote, either YES we accept lowering the bottom or No we dont. They can spin up BK all they want, we could have a deal imposed on us but they can not make us accept it. Even if the contract is abrogated we still continue to negotiate. We are the only group at AA that is at the bottom of the industry, AA is asking all the others to go to the middle, we are at the bottom and they are asking us to make the bottom deeper. This would set a new precedent in BK.

True and it's unfortunate for you guys. How would the predicament you are in be different if the IAM didn't start the concessions train at US Air in 2002? You're right and it's unfortunate the AFL-CIO didn't act sooner. It appears they only act is the union or collective bargaining process is threatened (not the workers).

Josh

 

[Bob Owens]

True and it's unfortunate for you guys. How would the predicament you are in be different if the IAM didn't start the concessions train at US Air in 2002? You're right and it's unfortunate the AFL-CIO didn't act sooner. It appears they only act is the union or collective bargaining process is threatened (not the workers).

Josh

Cant say I disagree. I guess once people get comfortable with their six figure salaries their priorities change. The fact that they have done nothing since 2007 to correct what happened in NWA vs AFA and instead focused all our resources on representation elections under the RLA and Wisconsin reinforces its more about protecting their revenue stream than workers rights. Sad, so sad.

They went and got the law changed on Representation elections under the RLA, a law that as it stood still alowed workers under the RLA to be the most heavily unionized in the economy, while they did nothing to address the ruling where the court said that if an airline contract is abrogated in BK, (even though 1167 says that contracts under the RLA can not be abrogated in BK) that it never existed, so unlike workers under the NLRA we can not strike even if the company unilaterally changes terms, shows that its not about protecting our rights but making it easier for them to collect more dues. As it turned out even with the new rules and the induction of thousands of unionized workers into Delta they still rejected having a union. As a Union person I can understand the arguement about wanting to get evryone unionized, this way you can leapfrog off each other and keep pace with inflation and not have some Non-union workforce cutting your balls off by working for less but the fact is that we are the lowest paid, we get less vaction , Holidays and sick time than our non-union counterparts. Now the company is trying to capitalize on that ruling to pressure us into working for even less! The big threat is that we could end up with no contract! Well is that real;ly as bad as what they are offering? If we have no contract then there's always the chance we could negotiate something better, something at least as good as what non-union Jet Blue or Delta has but if we get a contract close to waht the company is asking for we are pretty much guaranteed to be at the bottom till 2018, In fact there is no guarantee that we would even get that, the company could come back for more anytime in between like they did in 2003.

So instead of correcting the injustice where we are encumbered by all the restrictions of the RLA with none of the protections of the RLA while at the same time not given the ability to defend ourselves from unilateral actions like workers under the NLRA our unions took our resources and focused on trying to get more people paying dues. Then they wonder why the votes fail? Clueless, absolutely clueless. If Unions showed that they were willing to fight and make gains for their members then non-union workers would overcome whatever obsticles there were to join, but why would anyone pay want to dues to get less than Non-union?

 

[Vortilon]

You soaking up all that OT? Somebody is. Minority? Try silent majority. When the loud mouths leave with the break room rhetoric, the real meaningful discussions start. Most would vote yes now.

I don't blame Bob. I am engaging in thoughtful spirited discussion with him. So far all his beliefs have been proven wrong and the whole BK process has just started. Will he ever admit he was wrong unless his goal was to thin the pool of AMTs so he could ask for more later. Were those even his jobs to gamble with? I guess they were since he is still sitting at the table and trying to extend the process beyond BK. Maybe he can get a deal with Geo Pay now that all those pesky overhaul jobs have been cut.

Yep, some people are going to die on their feet but we that stay will be getting Geo Pay...maybe. So we gave up retiree medical, the pension, and $37 and hour for Geo Pay or whatever else Bob would like to get in JFK. Awesome.

Meaningful discussions? Gimme a break, I haven't met one guy on the floor that wouldn't love to throttle Jim Little and his fellow international parasites. Did you even read the TA? Some raise...right - at what cost? I haven't forgot what your heros at the TWU have done for us. Forget the recent TA. How did Jim Little get so badly outsmarted in 2003? Our benefits concessions our second to none - now that the pensions are all but gone! What about the chief slug Ed Kosiatek? Remember the 95 contract? That one was classic TWU. How low are you willing to go? Most of us are tired of giving up pay and benefits to preserve the TWUs headcount of dues paying workers!

As much as you want to try, you will never convince anybody that Bob Owens is to blame. I could walk through any breakroom here at DFW with AMFA authorization cards and get pretty close to 100% signed in short order. What does that say about anybody's confidence in the TWU? Bod didn't create that hatred.

As far as the BK process goes, it will end up in Sean Lane's hands. In regard to the OT question, it is my day off, and I'm at home. The amount I work did not change.

 

[700UW]

True and it's unfortunate for you guys. How would the predicament you are in be different if the IAM didn't start the concessions train at US Air in 2002? You're right and it's unfortunate the AFL-CIO didn't act sooner. It appears they only act is the union or collective bargaining process is threatened (not the workers).

Josh

Actually no, the every union at US Airways in 2002 were forced to give concessions when US Airways filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy, your lame attempts to discredit the IAM has failed.

ALPA was the first union on the property at US Airways to give concessions, and they did it before US filed chapter 11, the IAM M&R voted down concessions the first time in chapter 11.

And they were plenty of time in airline history that employees gave concessions way before 2002.

Try again, and maybe you should take the time to educate yourself before you try and attack the IAM, once again you are proven wrong, how does that feel?

It was the TWU at AA who came up with the "B" scale, that's concessions.

Don't let the facts get in your way Joshie, for someone who claims to be so smart and educated, your posts fail to prove that!