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On 4/17/2003 11
10 AM WXGuesser wrote:
"Reasonably expected lifetime earnings"... Reasonable to whom?
Reasonable to anyone but you I guess. I feel that expecting to earn at least what a plumber or electrician earns is reasonable. I feel that expecting to get what our competitor SWA pays their mechanics is reasonable.
Now if you were to state "our earnings under the previous contract would have been 40% greater" then I might be able to agree with you. But then I would point out that that contract was contributing to unsustainable losses by your employer, and if those losses had continued, your employer would have had no money left in 6 months-1 year, how would that FACT have altered your expected lifetime earnings? With no job or starting over at the bottom somewhere else? Would those life time earnings have been less? Or more?
Since your numbers are entirely theoretical and are based on false assumptions, they have no basis in fact and are therefore irrelevant.
What fact? Just as I am using assumptions so are you. What makes your assumptions any more valid than mine? Inflation is not a false assumption. The 17.5% pay cut is not a false assumption. The loss of sick time, Holiday pay, double time and all the other things we are to give up are not false assumptions. My assumption that inflation over the next six years will be consistant with inflation over the last thirty is more valid than your assumption that AA will continue to have to severe revenue problems. History supports my assumption but refutes yours. In the past the industry had rebounded strongly after short periods of heavy losses. My assumptions are based in facts yours are based in "ifs".
How do I know? Simple.
1) AA needs DIP financing if they file Ch. 11.
2) To get DIP financing, the lenders say "We need $2.3B in concessions."
3) No DIP financing = Chapter 7 = No jobs for any of us.
AA would rather not file Ch. 11 if it doesn''t have to. If I believe nothing else they say, I believe that the management wants the airline to survive. If that were not the case, they simply would have filed. So therefore, they tried to analyze the situation and say "What do we need to get our costs back to a reasonable, manageable level in this revenue environment." So that''s what they go ask for instead.
"This revenue enviornment will not be permanent". The company is seeking long term cuts that are unreasonable. As a mechanic, my wages, benifits and work rules are comparable to SWA. What I am being expected to do is work for less than SWA so AA can pay their managers salaries that are in excess of SWA. All I say is pay me the same as SWA. Is that unreasonable? Why should I work for less to make up for a flawed strategy and incompetant management?
In bankruptcy, you would have been dealing not with the company but with those DIP financiers, secured creditors. They don''t care about what cost advantages you have over anybody else, or about your seniority or station protection or anything else. They are concerned only with the bottom line that they will not lose their money they are putting up as DIP financing. And anything that stands in the way of that will be removed (like your contract). The judge is not your friend; he is there to guarantee the secured creditors get their money. So you are screwed...
You are talking out of your arse here. There is a lot more involved to abrogating a labor agreement than that.
The 1113 letters are not tied to the current management team; they are tied to the Company itself. Re-read the language. Granted it is thin protection, but in the process above, the company does have a voice, albeat a small one. Employees and unions are unsecured creditors. We have no voice.
Maybe right for you because you have no union. But for those of us who are in a union-Wrong. The RLA is still in effect even if the judge abrogates the agreement. The RLA requires negotiation.
And don''t call me stupid...
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On 4/17/2003 11
10 AM WXGuesser wrote:"Reasonably expected lifetime earnings"... Reasonable to whom?
Reasonable to anyone but you I guess. I feel that expecting to earn at least what a plumber or electrician earns is reasonable. I feel that expecting to get what our competitor SWA pays their mechanics is reasonable.
Now if you were to state "our earnings under the previous contract would have been 40% greater" then I might be able to agree with you. But then I would point out that that contract was contributing to unsustainable losses by your employer, and if those losses had continued, your employer would have had no money left in 6 months-1 year, how would that FACT have altered your expected lifetime earnings? With no job or starting over at the bottom somewhere else? Would those life time earnings have been less? Or more?
Since your numbers are entirely theoretical and are based on false assumptions, they have no basis in fact and are therefore irrelevant.
What fact? Just as I am using assumptions so are you. What makes your assumptions any more valid than mine? Inflation is not a false assumption. The 17.5% pay cut is not a false assumption. The loss of sick time, Holiday pay, double time and all the other things we are to give up are not false assumptions. My assumption that inflation over the next six years will be consistant with inflation over the last thirty is more valid than your assumption that AA will continue to have to severe revenue problems. History supports my assumption but refutes yours. In the past the industry had rebounded strongly after short periods of heavy losses. My assumptions are based in facts yours are based in "ifs".
How do I know? Simple.
1) AA needs DIP financing if they file Ch. 11.
2) To get DIP financing, the lenders say "We need $2.3B in concessions."
3) No DIP financing = Chapter 7 = No jobs for any of us.
AA would rather not file Ch. 11 if it doesn''t have to. If I believe nothing else they say, I believe that the management wants the airline to survive. If that were not the case, they simply would have filed. So therefore, they tried to analyze the situation and say "What do we need to get our costs back to a reasonable, manageable level in this revenue environment." So that''s what they go ask for instead.
"This revenue enviornment will not be permanent". The company is seeking long term cuts that are unreasonable. As a mechanic, my wages, benifits and work rules are comparable to SWA. What I am being expected to do is work for less than SWA so AA can pay their managers salaries that are in excess of SWA. All I say is pay me the same as SWA. Is that unreasonable? Why should I work for less to make up for a flawed strategy and incompetant management?
In bankruptcy, you would have been dealing not with the company but with those DIP financiers, secured creditors. They don''t care about what cost advantages you have over anybody else, or about your seniority or station protection or anything else. They are concerned only with the bottom line that they will not lose their money they are putting up as DIP financing. And anything that stands in the way of that will be removed (like your contract). The judge is not your friend; he is there to guarantee the secured creditors get their money. So you are screwed...
You are talking out of your arse here. There is a lot more involved to abrogating a labor agreement than that.
The 1113 letters are not tied to the current management team; they are tied to the Company itself. Re-read the language. Granted it is thin protection, but in the process above, the company does have a voice, albeat a small one. Employees and unions are unsecured creditors. We have no voice.
Maybe right for you because you have no union. But for those of us who are in a union-Wrong. The RLA is still in effect even if the judge abrogates the agreement. The RLA requires negotiation.
And don''t call me stupid...
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