628AU, you do not have a clue, were you part of the IAM in 1992? I dont think so. Were you part of the IAM in 1995 thru 1999? I dont think so. What you fail to see is that the company agrees to what is in a contract also. Mechanic and Related have been unionized since 1949 at US Airways and many people before you and I have fought to achieve what we have.
I was around in 1992 when good ole us air, raped all the non-union people and took just about everything they had. Were you around then? Back in 1992 the Customer Service Agents and Fleet Service employees were non-union, the company unilaterally imposed new conditions on them once the pilot group accepted concessions. They lost their sick time, vacation, OJI time, thier pension was frozen and they no longer had a defined contribution plan, they company took 40% of the full time employees and made them part time, cutting there hours from 40 to 25 a week, therefore making them pay several hundred dollars a month for family medical insurance, in CLT you had to have had at least 13 years with the company in order to maintain full time status, they took away the Express work from them causing mass layoffs, contracted out mail and frieght causing loss of revenue and jobs, imposed pay cuts on them, all the while when you had employees on the property with less then three years that the company could not impose new work rules on them because they were unionized.
And I do not know any job or industry that provides job security these days. Go ask all these companies that move their production overseas and pay there workers like a dollar an hour and ask them why we as consumers still pay the same price for the goods when they were paying someone in the US $15 an hour to produce the same product.
Also the work done by planners and mcu can be be farmed out to Airbus of Boeing, maybe Dave should have gotten those jobs since you make more then utility or stock clerks.
From Airbus:
Airbus provides high quality, customised technical data compliant with the latest ATA (Air Transport Association) standards and available on CD-ROM, as digital data in SGML format or through Airbus on-line services.
This service:
Defines, produces and supplies technical data products and services for Airbus aircraft support;
Familiarises operators with technical data products and services;
Supports operators on a daily basis in the use of technical data products and services.
Airbus Materiel Support operates as a service centre, providing materiel and related services to the Airbus aircraft fleet worldwide. It ensures the supply and availability of Airbus spares worldwide, and provides order desk services for all maintenance needs. In addition, it offers on-site spares assistance, combined with full spare parts data and provisioning support.
Airbus maintains a worldwide distribution network with several strategically located Materiel Distribution Centres in Hamburg and Frankfurt in Germany, in the Washington D.C. area in the United States, in Singapore and in Beijing.
Airbus has established a materiel support website for customers, enabling them to access the following information:
Part information, price, availability, location and lead-time.
Part number interchangeability.
Purchase order status reports.
Shipping details of ordered parts.
Information on the Airbus spares supply chain.
Materiel customer support and contact details.
E-mail.
Materiel supply covers:
Proprietary parts
Raw and bulk materiel
GSE and line maintenance tools
Modification and repair kits
Vendor equipment
Airbus can assign a spares representative to a customer in order to provide logistic assistance at the time of entry into service or whenever the buyer requests assistance.
Airbus provides airlines with a full initial provisioning service, including pre-provisioning and provisioning conference, training and provisioning data. A customised recommended spares parts list (RSPL) is provided.
Airbus maintains a central data bank on which information concerning the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) is collected. This may be used by customers for information regarding the support/repair/overhaul of concerned units.
At buyer's request, the Materiel Support Division will lease out items from a select range of Airbus proprietary units. This allows the lessee to temporarily replace a part removed from an aircraft for repair or overhaul.
Customised Lead Time (CLT) is a just-in-time delivery service, where Airbus guarantees an on-shelf stock of customer-planned proprietary parts at the nearest Airbus distribution centre. The customer does not need to hold the inventory, his spares requirements are delivered to his forwarder within two hours.
Airbus guarantees a maximum of 15 days' repair time for its proprietary parts.
A number of spares support options are available to customers. Airbus' experience and market knowledge can help optimise spares access costs.
Just look at Delta, they farm out some reservations work to Indai and Continental does the same to Mexico.
47 PM Speedbird wrote: 
