American to lay off 2500 pilots
 

More bad news...

Better still - lay off the top end of the seniority list - overpaid already - give them good redundancy terms and they can wander
away to play golf. Everybody else moves up - new commands
and hope for those who will provide the future of the airline.

Light the blue touchpaper and retire - yes I know it will never
happen..................

Well said beamer, these guys have had many good years with AA and profited nicely from it. Might be time to step aside for the younger pilots in the airline whose future depends on it's survival. All I can say is it's such a shame to see the current tidal wave of cash being lost at the US major carriers. I hope things can be turned around soon otherwise some very familiar carriers will be gone. Quite frankly, aviation at the moment is on the slide.

At the risk of being a pedant on the language ... the cash is not 'lost' as people have earned incomes and companies have provided services for which they have been paid. In that light, the money has been useful.

Naturally, too much of it has been spent and American is learning for itself, what it means to be at the top of the heap. As so many others have done before them and others in the future will learn ...

How about Wall Street, in NY City? Is this not where huge profits and losses are made on airline stocks? Think about the possibilities to manipulate the prices!

Could it be just a coincidence that the media has been warning for a while about a probable Chap 11 filing at AMR, and is it just chance that their stock must have dropped to a record low price per share in recent weeks? Which people inside AMR had an opportunity to invest large sums in very cheap shares of AMR stock when "gloom and doom" saturated the business media? Did some members of upper mgmt likely have large chunks of cash with which to invest, knowing that with the press' news of large pay cuts, the share prices could easily double or triple, as they reportedly did? Remember, share prices can easily double if only at a few bucks per share.

One of my points is that those who own major fractions of stock when things look bleak, stand to bring in huge profits once news hits Wall Street. Such major investors intentionally leak very bad news to Wall Street for weeks, in order to buy up thousands of shares and watch them very quickly earn huge profits? When you are ultrarich, bad news is a very good thing when you are well prepared and positioned (especially if you are on the Boards of Directors, salivating at the meaty scent of quick profits, with little concern, if any, for the thousands of familys losing their only major source of income), is it not?

This strategy is only one of many used by the fabulously wealthy "insiders" (this "can" also include former co-owners), never mind what the SEC rules dictate. The media helps to do their bidding, and to accomplish their goals by the repititious bad news from the same old major wire services (API, UPI, CNN, Fox...). Some of these same media writers are either too ignorant or indifferent/arrogant, to comprehend and explain to the laymen that an airline industry which primarily consists of hub and spoke networks, is designed to be quite inefficient, but many business reporters nevertheless chant the same old mindless mantra which blames labor for the main problems with such an inherently handicapped system.

As I understand it a lot of the AA guys and girls will be going to Embraer and Canadair school ! American Lite, appearing at an airport near you, soon !

The funny thing about these layoffs is that by laying off junior, lower paid pilots, labour costs actually go up!!

Each flight hour on the line has expenses, flight crew included. Now, after layoffs, the flight crew for that hour are paid more per hour, hourly operating costs go up, hence margins are reduced!

Micro-Economics 101

Canuck,

you would be correct if pay rates remained the same....the 23% across-the-board paycuts will ensure that the remaining pilots operate at a lower cost structure. AA has to be careful that they don't lay off TOO many folks (that's what the lawyer at the briefing said) in too much of a hurry, hence the 12-month implementation schedule.

Some folks are still in denial, including the NY APA rep, who just sent an e-mail blast urging folks to vote "no" and let bankruptcy take it's course....of course, he's senior....he tried to equate the situation to UAL in court and their pay rates, which is a dangerous fallacy for the reasons I'm about to post:

Apparently, again from the bankruptcy lawyer's briefing at DFW, AA has decided that any filing will be done in S. NY, with the same Judge that did EAL....as the lawyer said: "..you don't want to go to this court as a union with a "no" vote on your record..." This is not the same court that UAL is in....you cannot do an apples-with-apples comparison in bankruptcy; the creditors call the shots, not the unions. Many APA members have yet to grasp this point....and the amount of DIP financing available for airlines in the US is diminishing, imposing stricter terms.

Those with more knowledge than I, including 411A, please post some facts here for everybody's perusal...just to help set records straight.

Since you asked...
 

RRAAMJET,
The AA pilots now find themselves in (as G. Bush Sr.) would say...deep doggy dodo.
Time to face the music...of the realities of today. MUCH lower pay rates down the pike, whether they like it or not...and most certainly will not.
For those that will lose their jobs (some for a long time), good luck finding work in todays' environment. Wonder how many will try to 'downsource' to AA Eagle, an airline which they collectively look down upon?
Change of career a distinct possibility for many.:rolleyes:
The APA will always lie to their members, and have done so for a long time.

This time, I think the APA has been surprisingly honest with it's members....

As you say, the truth is a bitter pill for many.

The AA pilots now find themselves in (as G. Bush Sr.) would say...deep doggy dodo.
Time to face the music...of the realities of today. MUCH lower pay rates down the pike, whether they like it or not...and most certainly will not.
For those that will lose their jobs (some for a long time), good luck finding work in todays' environment. Wonder how many will try to 'downsource' to AA Eagle, an airline which they collectively look down upon?
Change of career a distinct possibility for many.
The APA will always lie to their members, and have done so for a long time.


As always 411A, you are consistent,

Again we read the musings from the pontificating US birdman. While it would be a pleasure to use the potential of the internet to learn from those who have gone before us junior guys, we again are to suffer his vindictive, inaccurate verbal defecation about a situation you know nothing about. His posts starts out with common knowledge available online to any village idiot then states that AA pilots look down upon the Eagle pilots. While there may be some conflict with those few American Eagle pilots who want a full date of hire merge, the collective group looks upon them with respect. The word "fool" comes to mind reading reading such garbage as written in his posts.

Your information is old, out of date and irrelevant. As far as I am concerned "old" is something to be respected. But as with anyone, the word "fool" can be added easily.

missing again...
 

Whatsalizad,
You were asked before by another member on this august forum with regards to your background, but notice that you fail to reply....those who live in glass houses should throw no stones...so as you seem to have all the answers, let's hear some.

AA guys have painted themselves into a corner, plain and simple. Bite the bullet time for them, make no mistake.
Fully expect their pension just might go bye-bye as well.

beamer and Count of Altibar...

I just woke up, a beautiful sunny day outside, sunday morning, but your comments want me to spill out my coffee.

Have you ever heard of senority? Maybe you were lucky in your career to get out of your pampers, then out of Highschool (maybe not in that particular order), then out of a flying school straight onto an A320. Guess what? In other parts of the world people are not that lucky. They have to work hard and take funny jobs to survive and build hours until the find THE airline job.

So, now, finally there after years of suffering, they found a decent airline job worked their way up to a Senior position. And then you come and suggest to lay them off. In preferance of younger LESS experienced guys? Maybe you also understand that an airline in trouble could actually benefit from people with buckets full of experience.

I am not in their shoes, but if I was an senior 777 Captain with AA, I wouldn't like that idea too much, that I was to be laid off after years of faithful service, and a younger FO who just joined on a 717 would keep its job...

Yep, you couldn't expect pilots to progress according to qualifications and ability instead of date of hire, why that would be communist. Like the military or managers, as a matter of fact...

Down with meritocracy!

Ability to do what... ? Airbubba I think you'll find we all have the same qualification too. Perhaps we should be promoted according to our crosswind landing technique?

"AA guys have painted themselves into a corner, plain and simple. Bite the bullet time for them, make no mistake."

411A, From reading the papers, it seems that the management of most of the large US carriers have painted their companies into a corner through mismanagement. How have the AA guys done that. They are employees along for the ride with what appears to be not too competent management. Interesting how some like to kick others when they are on the ropes through no fault of their own.

2500 AA pilots will get laid-off? Were they (often much older) TWA pilots with many years of experience there or mostly very junior pilots hired at AA?

No matter who it is, it is very unfortunate, but were some of the very publicized warnings about possible Chapter 11 filing made, partly to "position" the perfumed princes (on the inside) to buy many thousands of shares of stock very cheaply, and within a few weeks' time make many millions in profits when the share price very quickly tripled?

Some of those "very special people", who own fractions of stock (and out of the public's view, quietly have an airline's Board of Directors under their thumbs) probably own a house near the Bulldog in Amsterdam. Woops!;)

Heard from an AA Pilot that AA are losing $30.00 for every seat booked!!


Solution............Don't sell tickets!!

My sympathy lies with those who will be affected.

C.N.

Is it really...?
 

dudly,
Through no fault of their own, you say?
Hmmm, well I guess that the very excessive wages demanded by the APA has nothing to do with this.
Certainly would not agree.
That the AA management agreed to same certainly indicates that there is plenty of fault to go 'round.

Ignition Override, the breakdown of the 2500 pilots will be approximately 700 TWA and 1800 AA, which will be the following percentages: 61% of TWA's pilots will be gone (up to 16 years seniority), and 16% of AA's pilots (up to 3 years seniority) will be gone.

I'm sure you'll hear from RAAMJET and other AA/APA posters, that this is perfectly 'fair and equitable'. Strange sense of entitlement, especially from people who were not even born in the US.