Kev3188
Veteran
The blame should be placed squarely on your elected negotiating team.
You *are* the union. It's a horribly cliche, but it's true. If you don't like the way it's going, work to change it.
TWU or IAM in a Merger
- Thread starter chellow
- Start date
The blame should be placed squarely on your elected negotiating team.
You *are* the union. It's a horribly cliche, but it's true. If you don't like the way it's going, work to change it.
Yet another example that you are a business unionist.
No different than you cheering on concessions at other carriers then when asked about IAM concessions you say how under section 1113 the unions are required to negotiate concessions and had their contract abrogated. You admitted that the IAM gave concessions above the company ask to protect more jobs, only for USAir to then say they didn't want to supervise all the people and wanted to reduce head count. It's easy to see why the IAM would not want to cut headcount, all the dues revenue the unions brings in is keyed to how many members your (mis)representation is imposed on.
Josh
Really? When I asked you about the Hawaiian Ready Reserve language (identical to DL ready reserve) you had a different answer that you didn't know what their mindset was. Regardless of which local/district lodge you are talking about its the same IAM so you should have worked to change the injustice in the CBA language added:
Not to attack you in the slightest, you have been very consistent about your position that labor needs to be changed from the ground up but Black Magic has a point that the IAM, much like TWU leadership is not held accountable.
Josh
Kev3188
Veteran
The way I see it, union leadership-regardless of the name on the door- needs to be held accountable to the membership they serve. That's shouldn't merely be an expectation, it should be a demand, and it's the responsibility of every last member to stay engaged to ensure that occurs.
...And in turn, part of that "demand" should be the negotiating committee refusing to let awful language (be it HA's ready Reserve program, or the outsourcing loopholes in US' Fleet CBA) ever see the light of day.
Real tired
Veteran
Actually, that is a very good post, and underlines one of the problems. The "single issue" voter, or what we call them in Maintenance, the "disgruntled yes voter". We have a lot of them.
These people saw what was only good for "me" and "I" instead of "we" and "us".
Real tired
Veteran
And also a very good post. And deep down the reason why the IAMNPF was trust upon us after we resisted it for years. They needed the numbers, or "members" as some would call them.
freedom
Veteran
- Feb 15, 2006
- 3,244
- 274
i can see no logical reason that we the workers at US Airways can't have the money that's currently being given to the IAMNPF instead shunted over to our own personal 401k's ...
If IAM workers want to stay in the IAM pension , then they should by all means be allowed to do so , and if IAM workers want to leave the pension and switch to a 401K they should also be allowed to do so ...This is 2012 , and i think it's imporant for our workers to examine their retirment choices and then make those that best suit their own interests ...
I mean this isn't rocket science , it's just some numbers instead of going to one account , going over to another account ... pretty easy to make happen i would think .
If IAM workers want to stay in the IAM pension , then they should by all means be allowed to do so , and if IAM workers want to leave the pension and switch to a 401K they should also be allowed to do so ...This is 2012 , and i think it's imporant for our workers to examine their retirment choices and then make those that best suit their own interests ...
I mean this isn't rocket science , it's just some numbers instead of going to one account , going over to another account ... pretty easy to make happen i would think .
- Banned
- #68
Once again your lying, I have never said the IAM agreed to concessions above the company ask.
Why do you constantly lie and post false information?
I will call you out everytime you lie and you seem to never answer anything asked of you.
Keep lying Joshie.
Hope you had a merry chirstmas.
robbedagain
Veteran
- Oct 13, 2003
- 11,125
- 2,676
FREEDOM do u know the 401k is also based on the market... if it goes down.. the 401k tends to go down... i know bec i have fidelity and have 4 investments and anytime the market goes down the stocks down however with the iam pension even GOD FORBID should US shutter either in the merger or otherwise the iampf will still be there for us for the future
if we merger and it looks like it will now the aa pilots have an agreement for mou i think may be we should try to get the iampf more money towards the future than what we have now but i also see what youre saying too...
if we merger and it looks like it will now the aa pilots have an agreement for mou i think may be we should try to get the iampf more money towards the future than what we have now but i also see what youre saying too...
Jester
Veteran
I am going to disagree, even though I have favored the pension in the past for the simple reason that I have not been too overly impressed with the IAMNPF handling of the plan and the understanding as to how these multi-employer plans are structured based upon my readings of the Hostess bankruptcy. Honestly, there appears to be a fair amount of shenanigans as the solvency of the pension is dependent upon the continued contributions from other employers, and as how the greater the hourly contribution, the lower the return on investment for any given work group (I documented this later fact a couple of years ago on this Board).
Pensions are relatively easy to calculate based upon actuarial assumptions and expected rates of return, so when the IAMNPF makes a drasitic cut to the so-called "defined" benefit, they have either screwed-up big time on the actuarial assumptions or on the investment mix and calculated rates of return. That alone gives me pause, but when I am reading that because the IAM was dumped from Northwest Airlines, that causes our monthly pension in the future to decline, then I am thinking this is a Ponzi Scheme.
The primary advantage to having a larger number of contributors to a pension is that it provides a more accurate estimate to the expected actuarial assumptions under the Central Limit Theorm versus the actual outcome of life expectancies. A simple example is that I randomly choose one employee to base my estimate I could be wildly off, but if I choose tens of thousands in my study, then the extremes are averaged-out much closer to the actual. There are other advantages as to spreading-out the overhead of the pension's operations and the ability to diversify into alternative investment opportunities, but given the tens of millions of dollars in the pension plan and the tens of thousands of employees, these advantages of being even that much bigger (or that much smaller) should be minimal in their impact.
I like the idea of a pension, but not this one because I view this as little more than a rat hole to shovel in more money, and I could understand the Company balking at the idea of more money with fewer benefits, especially as wage improvements are more likely to get more votes to ratify an agreement. If I can figure out this pension, you can be damn well sure some bean counter with the Tempe Boys know the same thing.
Real tired
Veteran
You're darn right the Tempe Boys have this figured out, and in the case of Maintenance, they've had it figured out since '05 when we had our pension plan terminated and dumped into the PBGC. As soon as they dumped our plan, the management bonuses in the form of millions were handed out freely. That money should have been used to fund our plan instead of dumping it on the American tax payer.
At that time, the IAM and Company agreed to give me in place of funding my pension plan, $2600 per year that was to go into my 401K. On about that time is when the snake oil salesmen for the IAM came around and started hawking their "pension" plan. We had determined that at that time the rate of return on their plan was somewhere around 2 to 2.5%, and some 401k plans at that time were earning around 11 to 15%, and some as high as 20%.
The IAM was losing members and their pension liabilities were growing. They needed members because the pension was becoming insolvent. We resisted the plan for at least 3 years. Then with the Transition Agreement of ’08, we were placed into the plan and soon after the plan was placed in “endangered status”. It’s no wonder your benefit has been cut. I’m just waiting for mine to be cut also.
I don’t know where Fleet’s funding money came from, but for Maintenance, it came from my 401K match money. And so far I have invested around $13,000 into the plan. If I were to retire today, it would take me almost 3 years just to get back the money I have invested so far, and the return rate has remained about 2.5% to this day.
So I also agree with Freedom that we should have the opportunity to be in control of “our” money because I think I could have done better with “my” $13,000 than the return rate that I’m getting now. And finally what most don’t know is, if our plan with the IAMNPF, which is teetering on the brink of insolvency, should default into the PBGC as so many have done, your money is only worth around 35 cents ($.35) on the dollar.
At that time, the IAM and Company agreed to give me in place of funding my pension plan, $2600 per year that was to go into my 401K. On about that time is when the snake oil salesmen for the IAM came around and started hawking their "pension" plan. We had determined that at that time the rate of return on their plan was somewhere around 2 to 2.5%, and some 401k plans at that time were earning around 11 to 15%, and some as high as 20%.
The IAM was losing members and their pension liabilities were growing. They needed members because the pension was becoming insolvent. We resisted the plan for at least 3 years. Then with the Transition Agreement of ’08, we were placed into the plan and soon after the plan was placed in “endangered status”. It’s no wonder your benefit has been cut. I’m just waiting for mine to be cut also.
I don’t know where Fleet’s funding money came from, but for Maintenance, it came from my 401K match money. And so far I have invested around $13,000 into the plan. If I were to retire today, it would take me almost 3 years just to get back the money I have invested so far, and the return rate has remained about 2.5% to this day.
So I also agree with Freedom that we should have the opportunity to be in control of “our” money because I think I could have done better with “my” $13,000 than the return rate that I’m getting now. And finally what most don’t know is, if our plan with the IAMNPF, which is teetering on the brink of insolvency, should default into the PBGC as so many have done, your money is only worth around 35 cents ($.35) on the dollar.
Real tired
Veteran
This is what makes it so scary to me.
On or around ’10, I got paperwork from the IAMNPF stating that the plan was endangered and was approaching critical status. In other words, just about insolvent and heading to the PBGC.
It was then that they used the Pension Protection Act of ’06 to use prior years funding numbers (those years being when the plan was funded to more than 100%) to keep the plan solvent and out of the tax payers hands. That doesn’t mean the plan is funded fully today. Only that it shows funded to 105% because the numbers used are past years numbers, not todays. Or are they?
So far I have no paper work telling me the plan is not still covered under the PPA of ’06.
If not every IAM member is in the plan, then why do you keep touting it as a benefit of being in the IAM "we are the only union on the property with a pension"..."401K uses your own money, not the company's". But should we expect anything different from IAM Overspeed?
Josh
- Banned
- #75
Not every company that has IAM members are participants in the IAMNPF.
US Mechanic and Related are, was well a Maintenance Training Specialist and Fleet Service, the IAM is the only union with a Defined Benefit Plan on US, others have a 401k with a match, or a DCP which uses their own money.
US Mechanic and Related are, was well a Maintenance Training Specialist and Fleet Service, the IAM is the only union with a Defined Benefit Plan on US, others have a 401k with a match, or a DCP which uses their own money.
