Pension damage at United

[Ignition Override]

OK guys/gals, how many US airlines had a plan to pay a pilot an oft-quoted "lump-sum" after 10, 15 or even 20 years? Some major airlines never had it, or most of us somehow never heard about them.

You betcha, even if your company had no lump sum, then this is still supposedly the theoretical cure for saving one's career and survive the industry's worsening condition. Quite simple. Ganz einfach.

Let's look at the main problem here, seen from the perspective of pilots who either were very fortunate (with many years at one airline) or spent most of their careers in various foreign lands, also with no crystal ball. The pilot unions have only themselves to blame, even when TWA's unionized pilots agreed to about a 40% pay cut? And Northwest's 40%, which was a temporary major pay cut, accepted by the pilot group months before their Tentative Agreement passed? Other pilot unions (at early Republic, Flying Tigers etc), even many years ago, agreed to pay cuts worth lots of liquidity to the banks etc. But an airline's demise is still their fault. Even after replacing the union pilots at Continental with much lower paid scabs, who had no minimum standards for pay or benefits, Lorenzo and his wannabes should have created the most successful US airline. The pilots were no longer The Problem.
Maybe the Wall Street Airline whiz kid had no intention of anything, except self-enrichment, plus large crumbs tossed to his legal team. With much lower staff costs at Continental, based on the assumption that previous highers costs were the main problem, it should have become the leading carrier in the later 80s. Negotiating is one thing-but declaring Chapter 11 in '83 in order for the new airline savior to avoid the process, with solid support from the White House, is another thing altogether...after Frankie's stunt, the bankruptcy laws were modified.

Pilots can work for free, but without dedicated, professional management, a Board of Directors which has the integrity to live up to its corporate responsibilities (instead of personal perks), and a truly people-oriented person with his team at the top who leads by example (self-initiated 40% CEO pay cuts, and company stock, would be a start), there is little hope.

In order to be the primary culprits, in such a position of leadership, the Union MECs must also be responsible for hiring and firing CEOs?
Wait just a minute... those Boards of Directors can not be held responsible for the short-, mid- or long-term survival of the airline, can they? Quite true-that would keep labor out of the limelight. Only those "country club pilots" at Delta or wherever who, in many cases, agreed to a 25-39% pay cut, can be held responsible for negligence...if our ever-present Pprune Expert has the only true, crystal-clear Big Picture.

Now let's just pretend that a pilot is divorced and is not cold-hearted, no matter whose fault it was (a lack of healthy income prospects break up many marriages), and he/she wants to live one day's drive from a son or daughter (maybe 2 kids), hoping that a judge will allow frequent visits.

According to some on Pprune, the only intelligent solution for a career, without the benefit of hindsight is to simply fly overseas, apply for the job, study and work on the other side of the Blue Planet, and hoping for the chance to see a young child once or twice during the year-probably no birthdays, Christmas visits, school graduations. As one tries to communicate with a seriously unstable spouse (one ex-wife is called "Crazy M---" by the rest of her family in a southern state). I know this pilot-he lives in Indiana. That's only a ten-hour drive from two of his kids. Children grow up faster than we expect them to.

How about from Southeast Asia or the Middle East? Maybe they have frequent, flexible vacations and lots of days off. Ok, no sweat flying home to the US quite often. If not, simply forget the kids and elderly parents, be far away when they, possibly a brother or sister, become very ill or die. Or don't have any.
Life is so simple for the cold-hearted and superior intellects (to paraphrase H.G. Wells 'minds cool and vast'). Many of us are just too 'dense' to "wake up and smell the coffee", without the benefit of 20-20 hindsight.