Another overt display of how out of touch and incompetent cathay management is about what they're facing. Too little too late indeed. The momentum is well set and under way. It's not reversible except only temporarily by very large increases.
7-18% raise in housing and equally measly increase to children's education allowance won't even register. Hong Kong was again just yesterday declared the most expensive city in the world to live in. Anything short of a restoration to the previous terms will not have an effect on the momentum, even then only temporarily.
Temporarily because any and all increases can and will be unilaterally and with no due notice be taken away leaving you regrettung not taking that safer job back home when you could. You'd have to be desperate or mentally ill to stay any longer than you have to at a job working under no contract. This is what cathay caused for itself by cancelling long standing employment contracts and keeping pilots employed under unilaterally amendable company policy. An utter lack of credibility, permanently.
There are some cathay pilots who are able to find jobs elsewhere and are leaving for another job. These are the lucky ones. There are also cathay pilots who are simply collapsing and are not able to continue working. The number of pilots who are out on sick leave due to stress and all the nasty issues and disabilities it brings are thru the roof. They simply fade away thru disability or they call it early retirement. The best cathay can hope for is to prevent these pilots from collapsing out of the job. I'm guessing they've come up with these low increases for that reason.
Because the ones who can find a job elsewhere will not be swayed at all with these ridiculously small increases.