OK…you called me a coward. Tell me who you are if you feel inclined.
You certainly seem hot and bothered with the pilot wages in Canada. So what is your solution? Co-ordinate a nation wide strike?
I actually don’t really give a rat’s ass what pilots make. It really doesn’t affect me directly but I do have an opinion that you are free to ignore or comment on.
Demanding better pay is easier said than done in the wake of 9/11, higher insurance rates, through the roof fuel prices and tonn's of unemployed pilots kicking around.
9/11 is the easy scapegoat that everyone uses. Funny how the oil industry doesn’t have a problem recovering. Their costs increased, and so did the price of oil. Most don’t even flinch while they fill up the SUV.
If the costs of doing business go up on a commodity that is in demand, why take it out on your employees? The logical thing to do is raise prices.
In my opinion, it all started when the industry was de-regulated. Before that, as a national flag carrier Air Canada didn’t care if they made a profit or not and other operators were able to set fares for reasonable profitability. I’m not saying that nobody went bankrupt in those days, because of course there are always other factors.
Following de-regulation, Air Canada spent the next couple of decades killing competition by offering seats below cost, eventually resulting in its bankruptcy. This scorched earth policy caused the competition to reduce costs. Some costs were reduced by increased efficiency and the balance was recovered by wage reduction. Of course, Air Canada management don't even know the meaing of "efficiency".
In a perfect and just world, Air Canada would have never emerged from bankruptcy and the remaining airlines (and some new ones) would raise fares to offset increased costs instead of punishing employees for working in the aviation industry. And we could have erased this sad era in Canadian aviation. The world isn’t perfect however, and Air Canada is back, debt fee and virtually unscathed.
Its pretty sad when some pilots make less than bus drivers, some AMEs make less than their car mechanics and some flight attendants make a lower hourly wage than the checker at Safeway. Of course that’s not the case with newly resurrected Air Canada.
Airfares need to rise to levels that would allow those in the aviation industry to make a good wage. With Air Canada around again with the same management that steered them into bankruptcy, and offered predatory pricing, that just isn’t going to happen. Especially with people keeping the 9/11 myth alive.