Flight attendants at American Airlines are reasonable to want a new contract. Management at American Airlines is reasonable to point out that it cannot afford a generous contract. The context of the latest battle is the paltry profit-sharing AA just announced for flight attendants and a contentious exchange between American CEO Robert Isom and Julie Hedrick, President of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA).
Irreconcilable Differences: American Airlines Management And Flight Attendants Further Apart Than Ever
While Delta Air Lines flight attendants will receive a 10.1% profit sharing (in relation to annual pay) and United Airlines flight attendants will receive a 9.2% profit sharing, American Airlines flight attendants will receive only a 1.1% profit sharing. This has left flight attendants, already upset over the lack of progress on a new contract, even angrier.
At a town hall event this week, Hedrick confronted Isom about the paltry profit sharing and the lack of a new contract. Aviation insider JonNYC posted a pair of clips from the interaction between Isom and Hedrick after the APFA posted only the questions and not the answers:
https://twitter.com/xJonNYC/status/1750589945943855128?s=20
Note that Isom explains its lower profitability compared to Delta will result in a much lower profit-sharing total:
“We’re not as profitable as the industry leader, we are not, we’re far less profitable than the industry leader, and that’s why all these things that we talk about doing — straightening out our balance sheet, getting more efficient, finding ways to generate more revenue, all of that enables us to pay something that, let’s face it, is hard for us to do, given that we’re not as profitable as the industry leader.”
Also, note that there is no contractual guarantee of profit sharing between AA management and flight attendants. Indeed, the 1.1% is simply a gift.
Another flight attendant confronted Isom over her struggle to make ends meet and how she shares a “crash pad” in Boston with 12 other colleagues.
A 3-yr @AmericanAir Flight Attendant painfully explains to CEO Isom how she had to live with 12 co-workers in Boston.
Just to survive.
Mr Isom, your Flight Attendants will not accept a contract that allows us to just survive. #1u #strike pic.twitter.com/lYTF9UY1S2
— Association of Professional Flight Attendants (@APFAunity) January 25, 2024
There is no doubt that the current contract is particularly difficult for junior flight attendants. This particular flight attendant may have been clear about the wage conditions she accepted in 2021, but we’ve seen quite a bit of inflation over the last three years and it strikes me as impossible to make it on a salary of $30,000/year for full-time work. Of course, one answer is just to walk away or move out of a big city, but fighting for a contract that better compensates junior staff strikes me as a worthy goal. No full-time worker should have to struggle to survive or go on public assistance in the USA.
Irreconcilable Differences
I’m not going to discuss here the failure of AA leadership over the last several years to chart a corrective path for the carrier which seems to have no identity (we’ll save that for a future post). A rising tide does indeed lift all boats and the failure of management to innovate has taken a toll on profits.
But I do see irreconcilable differences between management and flight attendants here. A strike won’t help, but it will make things worse (AA should consider a lockout if a strike is authorized). Even if Isom works for free, there is little money for an industry-leading contract for flight attendants. And as long as 10 people are lining up to fill every FA job opening, there cannot realistically be much upward pressure on wages.
And so the vicious cycle continues. American Airlines flight attendants become more disgruntled and that is manifested in service onboard. Passengers react by booking away, particularly those discretionary premium travelers, taking their money elsewhere. Revenue and profits drop, making the business case even harder to increase wages.
I’m not sure what the answer is and do not think there is any short-term fix. But leadership matters and it is going to be a painful season for American Airlines as long as the two sides remain so far apart.
CONCLUSION
American Airlines flight attendants will receive only a 1.1% profit share, roughly 1/10 of what flight attendants on Delta Air Lines receive. This has left flight attendants even angrier as they battle for a new contact. But as AA struggles for profit, there is no easy fix: the austerity will likely continue as AA attempts to find a strategy that works.
Here is a test : Compare the individual salaries of All DEI managers , consultants , and trainers at the airline … with the salary structure of the cabin staff . My guess is you will find a large difference .
I don’t think anyone gets paid well in the airline industry outside the C-Suite! 😉
@Matt … Mostly agree … However , whenever I see DEI salaries exposed , it is on the high end . DEI is absurd from the get go .
Here’s an idea, kinda farfetched, but maybe FAs need to just do a better job, and on AA’s side, they need to fix their other issues. Then, maybe, the airline just gets better and more people would want to fly with them more, which increases profits.
It’s a crazy idea, I know, probably won’t happen
When did AA decide to be an airline? I thought they were a credit card company. And when did US flight attendants actually have any pride to command better wages? I thought they are there to barricade the galley and spend 10 minutes waking the entire plane up touting those credit cards.
Matt – what is that a % of? In other words, 1.1% of what? Total profits?
Your points, regardless or morality, is correct. There is tremendous demand to be an FA. If they want to to jump to Delta, they have the absolute right to do so (assuming they can get hired).
I tend to believe that while some regulation is often needed, markets tend to act as a somewhat efficient tool to normalize things. The reality is that siting in the galley on an iphone and occasionally pushing a cart down an aisle is not the most demanding job, and therefore is sought after. Sorry, but true.
1.1% of annual pay.
I’m more worried about irreconcilable differences between AA and its passengers.
Outside of AAdvantage being a better program than UA or DL’s there is nothing else.
Let me see if I understand this correctly. I am offered a job and I agree with the pay. Later on I am no longer happy with my salary so I go complain to my boss. He has 2 options: give me a raise or say there is nothing he can do. If he can’t raise my salary, I have 2 options: stay or quit. Why is this so hard for flight attendants? Not happy, find another job.
You clearly don’t understand the first thing about seniority or domiciles. Flight Attendants often put in DECADES of service before they can:
• transfer to the domicile closest to their home
• build enough seniority to hold a regular, predictable and sane schedule.
If a Flight Attendant leaves their airline for another… their seniority does not follow them. They will end up having to pick up their life and move again on the whim of where the airline wants them to be.
Kids like their school and are doing well? Tough, you spent 20 years with AA TO be able to hold a regular work schedule out of LAX… but now Delta wants you in SLC or ATL, and oh, by the way, you’re back on Reserve (last minute fill-in status), AND you lost 20 years of incremental wage increases.
I hope you better understand now.
Perhaps it’s time to cull the herd of flight attendants. Start by actually monitoring what is happening ( or not ) in the cabin. Vet your employees to remove perverts that record children in the lavatories. In addition to the pee phone victims, that dude was also recording children sleeping. Other FAs should have noticed something was not right, had they been paying attention. Maybe a lockout isn’t such a bad idea?
“ No full-time worker should have to struggle to survive or go on public assistance in the USA.”
Interesting to hear this fr9m you Matt. In today’s current environment what do you believe fast food workers should make? And what do you consider Full time? The general standard of 40 hours a week or the IRS determination of 30? This also makes a big difference. And what is “Public assistance” to you? Obamacare? WIC? EBT/ food stamps?
Just seems like a statement that isn’t based in reality unless the new minimum needs to be $20+ an hour, maybe $25 on a FT 30 hour a week job.
I agree. The idea that every entry-level job should offer a standard of living that involves no hardship just doesn’t seem realistic to me.
And if we magic-wand made all entry level jobs pay $100k and benefits, there’d be a sudden dramatic lack of entry level jobs, and a lot more hardship going around.
As for 40 or 30 hours being full time… I have a great, high-paying job, but if I worked 40 hours a week, I’d be the first person fired.
If you’re not born rich, getting set up in life is a struggle for the overwhelming majority of folks.
Matt, do you know where we could find FA salary scales? I’d love to see the actual breakdown between junior and senior attendants. Could be an easy fix to raise the floor and lower the ceiling if there’s that huge a gap?
The union publishes pay scales on their website: https://www.apfa.org/resources/pay/pay-info/
Pay step 1 = year 1, and so on.
There are a lot of variables that comprise F/A pay, but the most straightforward is to assume a 75 hour minimum guarantee, so multiply 75 * hourly rate to get gross monthly wages.
The last time American Airlines flight attendants went on strike, any FA who crossed the picket line to work was labeled, and is still labeled as a scab. The names of the flight attendants who did cross the picket line are well known. Some of these individuals HAD to cross the picket line. They needed the income, health insurance, or other factors determined that they had to disobey the union. The treatment of these individuals is abhorrent. I’m sure the same will happen again if there is a strike by AA’s FAs. Some people will need to work. They will forever be labeled scabs and treated like dirt. This is just one byproduct of a strike. That doesn’t mean that I do not sympathize with the FAs. Their salaries, especially for the very junior flight attendants, are very low. Senior FAs want and determine what the union bargains for; they do not care what the more junior FAs need or want. That points out a significant issue with the seniority system and how these negotiations proceed. I just see too many downsides to a strike, but if one happens, we could see the demise of AA, just like Eastern and other carriers who have not been able to survive a strike and recover.
Junior FAs who make very little money have only their union to blame. For decades the unions have bargained for pay scales that are heavily tilted in favor of the most senior members (who happen to hold most union leadership positions). The union negotiated contracts with no money for new members and that isn’t management’s fault.
You dare to come on here and post something that is truthful and makes sense? Better get an asbestos suit ready for the flames coming from the union shills…
They should impose a 1500-hr minimum experience requirement to be hired as an FA at a major airline. That will drive an artificial shortage and wages will rise.
@SeanM … Bravo .
It worked for the pilots
Genius
The union did this. Hard stop. Oh so typical, by the way.
They set in motion a structure where junior flight attendants get (far) less, so more senior FA’s get much more (you know — the mean, miserable ones who hate passengers).
They say they can’t afford it but throw an extra 1 billion at pilots. If you didn’t know they gave Retro pay to not just active pilots but pilots that RETIRED. They gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to people who aren’t even employees of the airline anymore and Robert Isom gives himself a nice multi-million dollar bonus. They have the money.
@FlightAttendant … +1 .
They “they threw an extra billion to pilots” because planes don’t fly themselves. And there is a shortage. You are expendable though and easily replaced. Sorry to give you the straight facts that everyone else pussy foots around.
And yet the boys in the C-Suite happily accept their bonuses, salary increases, and golden parachutes. 🙁
Cut the pay of upper management, and oh look they’ll quit their jobs.
Suddenly there are no people around to run the airline. Great move there buddy
The flight attendants should not be punished for management’s poor decisions. Especially when the ceo has given himself a recent massive pay raise due to his “performance”
This comment section is certainly full of sad group 9 incels. Y’all are so busy fetishizing those poor, submissive Middle eastern carrier FA’s you seem to have forgotten most American workers depend on their chosen profession to afford them such luxuries as food, housing, healthcare (do I go on?)
It’s simple, find another profession. No one here cares about your wallowing. At least not until you show us a level of pride and care in yourself and your job. Otherwise you can picket, yell, and threaten and we are all still laughing at you.
lol you sound like the kind of guy who complains about the seats being too small while asking for a seatbelt extender.
They took the job with the pay as stated and agreed to it. They are mostly rude and lazy on board the aircraft. They have been given way too much power by the federal government. Most don’t even have college degrees and flight attendant training is 3 to 6 weeks! More money… Give me a break! They don’t like it, they are free to quit.
AA reported $53Billion in revenue and over $820M in profit in 2023, according to the Wall Street Journal. The average AA executive compensation is $238,145 a year. The median estimated compensation for executives at AA including base salary and bonus is $241,369, or $116 per hour. The most compensated executive at AA makes $700,000, annually. The FAs grievances arent so out of synch when seen in the context of executive compensation for a fairly poorly run airline.