ALPA: It's Time for Regionals To Raise Pay

The unions routinely turn down increased wages at the bottom because they want even more increases at the top. In addition, the union divies up the total compensation, if both were paid $50/hr vs. $80/hr and $20/hr the company wouldn't care. Total cost is the same.

This is why companies have resorted to sign on bonuses because union contracts don't prohibit them.

Incidentally Mesa has no such bonus program, pays some of the lowest wages in the industry, and even requires you purchase a $500 iPad to show up for class yet has no lack of applicants.

What this tells me is pay is not a major consideration when it comes to making a decision on where to go, for most guys. So paying more won't alleviate the problem of not enough people. Lack of career advancement would be the #1, which is why PSA, Mesa, TSA, and Compass are filling classes and XJET, Endeavor, Eagle, etc. are struggling to get guys in the door despite large bonuses.
 
wheelsup said:
The unions routinely turn down increased wages at the bottom because they want even more increases at the top. In addition, the union divies up the total compensation, if both were paid $50/hr vs. $80/hr and $20/hr the company wouldn't care. Total cost is the same.

This is why companies have resorted to sign on bonuses because union contracts don't prohibit them.

Incidentally Mesa has no such bonus program, pays some of the lowest wages in the industry, and even requires you purchase a $500 iPad to show up for class yet has no lack of applicants.

What this tells me is pay is not a major consideration when it comes to making a decision on where to go, for most guys. So paying more won't alleviate the problem of not enough people. Lack of career advancement would be the #1, which is why PSA, Mesa, TSA, and Compass are filling classes and XJET, Endeavor, Eagle, etc. are struggling to get guys in the door despite large bonuses.
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Problem is, 1.9% of beans, is beans as dues. :)
 
It'll never happen. I've come too lean that that metric just makes it cheaper to send the flying back, which is a good thing.
 
Federal minimum wage, and local minimum wages are rising to a high point for those type of jobs. On the other hand a pilot is still well below that point. More pilots will be working at In and Out to survive than fly soon.
 
The existence of regional airlines is analagous to a care planning conference at an abortion clinic:

-how did this happen?
-what do we do now? Keep it? Or just terminate it?
- I don't know, but who is gonna pay for it? Either way?
-I don't have any money, don't look at me, this is all your fault.
-you just had to have it a few months ago, you dick!
- we had so much fun in the beginning, now you're going to leave me?!
-I got lotsa girls baby, you're not the only girl in town.
- why don't you just get fixed? We don't need anymore of these babies being born!
-but I love you baby!
 
FlybyLaw said:
Federal minimum wage, and local minimum wages are rising to a high point for those type of jobs. On the other hand a pilot is still well below that point. More pilots will be working at In and Out to survive than fly soon.
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That may no longer truly be applicable in some parts of the country.
http://www.adn.com/article/20131023...ts-arent-learned-professionals-hourly-workers
In OT case, judge says Alaska pilots aren't learned professionals but hourly workers
Yereth RosenAlaska Dispatch News
October 23, 2013
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Alaska guardsmen set standard for Arctic search and rescue
Why are Alaska State Troopers mum about botched rescue on Safety Sound?


The nine pilots suing for overtime pay insisted they are not learned professionals -- a category reserved for attorneys, certified public accountants, and others with academic and intellectual credentials. Employers need not give overtime pay to learned professionals under federal labor law.



The borough contended its search-and-rescue pilots are exempt professionals who have gone through “a prolonged course of specialized instruction in a field of science and advanced knowledge” that goes well beyond the training given to typical pilots, according to a motion filed earlier this year by the borough, a rare local government with its own fleet of search-and-rescue aircraft.



U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason sided with the pilots on that question. She based her Aug. 26 ruling in part on a 2010 decision by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals issued in the case of two helicopter pilots employed by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.



But the search-and-rescue pilots should not be expecting any extra pay just yet.



Gleason, in the same ruling, agreed with the borough that “highly compensated” pilots -- those making at least $100,000 a year -- are not entitled to extra compensation for overtime work. The U.S. Department of Labor rules grant overtime exemptions to employees with that level of annual pay.



Now the lawsuit, which promises to have implications for professional pilots around Alaska, has reached an accounting phase. The sides are reviewing work hours, pay received to date and what counts toward the $100,000-a-year threshold. Under provisions of Gleason’s order, those calculations are complicated by two-week-on, two-week-off rotational work schedule that the pilots began in 2004. Those rotations were started at the urging of the pilots, the borough said in one of its motions, because some did not want to live in Barrow full-time, or their spouses were unwilling to move there.



The case had been scheduled for a jury trial to start Oct. 21, but the trial has been postponed indefinitely. The parties were in court Monday to hash out future deadlines and schedules.



Attorneys in the case declined to comment on the record.



The borough now is seeking to hire at least one new pilot for its Search and Rescue Department. Pay is $2,954.03 biweekly; overtime pay, presumably, would add to that.
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wheelsup said:
In addition, the union divies up the total compensation, if both were paid $50/hr vs. $80/hr and $20/hr the company wouldn't care. Total cost is the same.
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That's actually not true at the regional level where there is (when the industry is moving) attrition. A company doesn't have a huge problem putting money at the end of the pay scale because nobody is ever going to be there, but if they raise first year FO pay, they have to make that pay out for every single pilot they bring on property. The last 15 years haven't been like that due to all the reasons we know so well, but that's how the model is actually supposed to function.

At a major, yes... it makes more sense to bury money at the end of the pay scale because that's where most guys will spend most of their time. Personally I'd rather suffer through a few years of slightly lesser pay and then enjoy a bunch of years at top of scale than go through a few years of slightly more pay and then spend a whole bunch of years making a slightly smaller amount a the top of the scale.

Math and stuff.
 
I have no idea what the solution is.

Regional A is flying Mainline carriers subcontracted routes for X. Regional A has low margins and needs the Mainline carrier to pay X+Y. Regional B RFP's to fly Regional A's routes for X or even X-Z.

Pilots see the growth at Regional B and head there in droves: "Faster upgrade! They're getting shiny jets!"

Regional A faces more cost pressures from attrition while Regional B grows. Regional B "matures" and costs increase. Regional C throws in an RFP for Regional B's business.

This is going on right before our eyes.

I think the future is more mainline carriers doing more of their own "regional" flying, but then that leaves out a bunch of regional pilots that maybe didn't fit the traditional requirements of the majors, which leads to, uhh, Jar Jar… Dark side.
 
BobDDuck said:
That's actually not true at the regional level where there is (when the industry is moving) attrition. A company doesn't have a huge problem putting money at the end of the pay scale because nobody is ever going to be there, but if they raise first year FO pay, they have to make that pay out for every single pilot they bring on property. The last 15 years haven't been like that due to all the reasons we know so well, but that's how the model is actually supposed to function.
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That sounds good in theory but past precedence has said otherwise. Both Republic and Pinnacle management tried to do it and both times the unions stopped the raise in its tracks. They wanted raises for everyone, not just F/O's.

At a major, yes... it makes more sense to bury money at the end of the pay scale because that's where most guys will spend most of their time. Personally I'd rather suffer through a few years of slightly lesser pay and then enjoy a bunch of years at top of scale than go through a few years of slightly more pay and then spend a whole bunch of years making a slightly smaller amount a the top of the scale.

Math and stuff.
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As far as starting low and going up at a major, if you look at the pay scales, you'll see they were slanted toward maximizing earning potential in the last 10 years of the game. The way pensions were calculated typically was taking the highest 5 years of earnings out of the last 10, and averaging it, and then calculating the pension based upon those. This is why the CA widebody scales are so high, and FO scales are so low. Most of us will be in our mid-40's before we even top out.

Going forward, with 401k the standard way of saving for retirement, you need to front load your pay. Spending the last 5-10 years making $300k starting off at $40k-$70k vs. our entire career making ~$200k (just using random numbers) most likely will net a better long term financial position.

The money pile is a finite pile. Management doesn't care how it's distributed as long as the numbers match.
 
Derg said:
I think the future is more mainline carriers doing more of their own "regional" flying, but then that leaves out a bunch of regional pilots that maybe didn't fit the traditional requirements of the majors, which leads to, uhh, Jar Jar… Dark side.
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Air Canada's regional system is a compact and concentrated version of whats going on in the US. They used to be the majority shareholders in Air BC, Air Ontario, and Air Nova. They merged these three plus Canadian Regional into one, Jazz, when AC and Canadian merged in 2000. They sold Jazz off and contracted out flying to them in 2006. Air Canada then started contracting out more flying to Sky Regional and Air Georgian (who is the only P2F regime in Canada and also requires a one year bond after you're hired). Georgian bought old CRJ100s from Jazz. Georgians dispatch reliability started to suck because Georgian cuts costs like no ones business, and this is starting to hurt AC. Jazz is now picking up the CRJ routes that Georgian was flying, and rumour has it AC is going to axe the CRJ contract with Georgian and just utilize them for B1900 flying (which is what they used to do). Sky Regional used to do their own dispatch, but rumour also has it AC was unimpressed with Sky Regionals dispatching ability, so AC took over dispatch for them too.

Long story short, AC started to contract out regional flying to more than one operator, got burned, and sent it back to Jazz, and ended up doing some of it themselves. I wouldn't be surprised to see more of this happen.
 
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wheelsup said:
That sounds good in theory but past precedence has said otherwise. Both Republic and Pinnacle management tried to do it and both times the unions stopped the raise in its tracks. They wanted raises for everyone, not just F/O's.



As far as starting low and going up at a major, if you look at the pay scales, you'll see they were slanted toward maximizing earning potential in the last 10 years of the game. The way pensions were calculated typically was taking the highest 5 years of earnings out of the last 10, and averaging it, and then calculating the pension based upon those. This is why the CA widebody scales are so high, and FO scales are so low. Most of us will be in our mid-40's before we even top out.

Going forward, with 401k the standard way of saving for retirement, you need to front load your pay. Spending the last 5-10 years making $300k starting off at $40k-$70k vs. our entire career making ~$200k (just using random numbers) most likely will net a better long term financial position.

The money pile is a finite pile. Management doesn't care how it's distributed as long as the numbers match.
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Agreed. Even the infamous J.O. responded to the low pay claims with "We've got pilots making 100k+. I'll cut the money pie any way the union wants if they want to raise starting pay"

BTW I've heard Endeavor is now having no problems filling classes
 
Trip7 said:
Agreed. Even the infamous J.O. responded to the low pay claims with "We've got pilots making 100k+. I'll cut the money pie any way the union wants if they want to raise starting pay"

BTW I've heard Endeavor is now having no problems filling classes
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J.O. may be a bastard, but he's no dummy.
 
I don't think we will ever see higher wages at the regionals for the foreseeable future. Here's why:

1) Why should management raise pay? Regionals that offer a quick upgrade aren't having any problems filling classes. Regionals who offer a bonus (Endeavor not included) are having trouble filling classes.

2) Management knows that if they raise starting pay, that eventually the markets will change and so will the their metrics. If they give raises now, they will eventually just have to fight an uphill battle in the future to get back money in the form of concessions. Raising wages is a permanent fix to a temporary problem.

3) Regionals are shrinking. Mainline doesn't necessarily want them to shrink, but that is just the reality of the situation they have created. There is a reason that UAL, AAG, and DAL are all looking at adding large numbers of 100 - 150 seat jets to their fleet in the next 5 years. Regionals will shrink, and more flying will go back to mainline. There will be more mainline jobs, but pilots will spend a lot longer at group 1 pay before they start flying the bigger metal at mainline.

...I do believe that will be the ultimate solution to the regional "pilot shortage". More flying back to mainline and guys spend longer at group 1 rates while flying the "regional routes" on slightly larger mainline aircraft. Regionals will still exist, there will still be regional lifers, and the whipsaw will likely continue to some extent and timing will continue to be important. There will just be less regional jobs and more mainline jobs, that's all.
 
chrisreedrules said:
I don't think we will ever see higher wages at the regionals for the foreseeable future. Here's why:

1) Why should management raise pay? Regionals that offer a quick upgrade aren't having any problems filling classes. Regionals who offer a bonus (Endeavor not included) are having trouble filling classes.

2) Management knows that if they raise starting pay, that eventually the markets will change and so will the their metrics. If they give raises now, they will eventually just have to fight an uphill battle in the future to get back money in the form of concessions. Raising wages is a permanent fix to a temporary problem.

3) Regionals are shrinking. Mainline doesn't necessarily want them to shrink, but that is just the reality of the situation they have created. There is a reason that UAL, AAG, and DAL are all looking at adding large numbers of 100 - 150 seat jets to their fleet in the next 5 years. Regionals will shrink, and more flying will go back to mainline. There will be more mainline jobs, but pilots will spend a lot longer at group 1 pay before they start flying the bigger metal at mainline.

...I do believe that will be the ultimate solution to the regional "pilot shortage". More flying back to mainline and guys spend longer at group 1 rates while flying the "regional routes" on slightly larger mainline aircraft. Regionals will still exist, there will still be regional lifers, and the whipsaw will likely continue to some extent and timing will continue to be important. There will just be less regional jobs and more mainline jobs, that's all.
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By higher wages do you mean excluding bonuses? Because right now overall compensation at the regionals is higher than ever before, especially for FOs.
 
Trip7 said:
By higher wages do you mean excluding bonuses? Because right now overall compensation at the regionals is higher than ever before, especially for FOs.
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Its really not all that much in the big picture. An FO starting today with a $5000 starting bonus is being compensated roughly the same as an FO starting ten years ago because the pay scales are still roughly the same. However the cost of training and subsequently the loan burden is far exceeding those multiples of inflation rates.

By going to a place with a quick upgrade to captain pay scales you will far exceed any pittance of hiring bonuses being offered by the regionals within months of upgrade versus spending years on FO scales.

So yes.....its about the money.
 
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