Tuesday, October 06, 2015

Even pilots sometimes have to picket

 Pilots picketing outside Ruan Center in Des Moines Monday.



Here’s a sight you don’t often see in the financial power centers of downtown Des Moines: Marchers in business suits and ties carrying picket signs. But there they were Monday, looping continuously outside the high-rise Ruan Center, where captains of industry gaze out on the city skyline, and the elite dine in members-only serenity and splendor.

As labor protests go, it was classy. The picketers carried printed signs with fancy fonts and logos. A truck with changing graphics on its side drove around the block carrying the same message. But these marchers are well schooled in class. They're airline pilots, delivering the wealthiest on private jets to meetings, vacations, shopping, ski trips, tournaments or wherever else imagination might lead their clients.

Working for a company called NetJets, which owns the largest fleet of "fractional" (jointly owned) jets in the world, they might fly as far as China or as close as a 30-minute jaunt. Asked if the clients are multimillionaires, union Vice President Paulette Gilbert replied,  “At a minimum.” That entitles them to smoke on board, sip wines chosen by Wine Spectator experts, and dine on dishes they chose from local restaurants. They can take along uncaged pets of various sorts.

“This means NetJets pilots have direct contact with animal hair, feathers, etc.,” says a NetJets website section on employment. “Every passenger on board a NetJets flight receives first-rate service — even if that passenger happens to be a Jack Russell,” the web site boasts.

But the 2,700-plus pilots, who belong to the NJASAP (NetJets Association of Shared Aircraft Pilots) union feel while everyone else gets pampered, they get the short shrift. They’ve been working without a contract since 2013, and are in mediation talks. They say the management is seeking “deep concessions” in salary, health and other benefits. They declined to offer specifics, citing the mediation process, but say their wages and benefits have scarcely kept pace with inflation. Union President Pedro Leroux told Fox News that after 10 years, he makes in the lower $90,000 range and can work up to 98 hours at a stretch during the seven-day on, seven-day off rotation. He said Netjets pilots earn 40 percent less than counterparts at the large commercial airlines and that more than 30 percent are looking to leave.

NetJets is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, so the standoff might surprise people who recall CEO Warren Buffett calling to raise taxes on people earning a million dollars or more. Asked by Fox News about these pilots, Buffett said their pay averages $145,000 a year, and the pilots happy with their schedules.

NJASAP’s website says Buffett and Vice Chairman Charles Munger have emphasized the value of "dedication, passion and trustworthiness, among other attributes." A union ad placed in some media says increasing health care costs “may be the trendy thing to do in the CEO club, but it is not the Warren Buffett way.”

“The company has said in its news releases and filings that they are profitable. There’s a return on income,”  NJASAP spokeswoman Elizabeth Lykins told me. “They’re taking delivery of aircraft." But they’re negotiating, she said, “as if we’re in a terrible financial predicament.”

The union says there were four years of bad blood with former NetJets CEO Jordan Hansell, a Des Moines native who left the company in June.  Negotiations have since resumed, but the pilots are frustrated because they say the company refuses to disclose even who is on its board of directors. They believe Greg Abel of Des Moines, who runs Berkshire Hathaway Energy, is a NetJets board member along with NetJets CEO Adam Johnson and COO Bill Noe, and two others whose identities they do not know. But the CEO and COO refuse to confirm that or identify the two others, and my calls to spokespeople for Abel in Des Moines and NetJets in Columbus were not returned.

It was the Abel connection that brought the pilots to Des Moines on Monday. In a full-page ad in this newspaper, the union wrote: “Greg Abel: Pilot Negotiators need to know who is pulling the strings at NetJets.”

NetJets claims on its website to have moved further in talks with the union this summer than in the last two years, despite missing a targeted Sept. 3 deadline. But it says the sides are still far apart on pay and benefits “due to the parties’ views about the economics of this business — and thus how much additional cost we can take on over the next decade — as well as different expectations concerning the demand for the services we provide. … We’re a unique company that needs to reinvest in its brand.”

But the union says that brand has been built up over a decade by its employees, and that the company's focus on “short-term profits” has been detrimental.

Without knowing specifics, it's impossible to say whose case has more merit. But it does seem strange for a company to withhold information from employees about its board membership. Given the strenuous, skilled work they do, the pilots' pay is hardly lavish. And at a time of diminishing labor clout, it's refreshing to see them taking to the street — politely, of course — to ask for what they feel they deserve.

Story and photos:  http://www.desmoinesregister.com

  Captain Jeff Stein, NJASAP Strike Prep Co-Chair in Des Moines Monday.

1 comment:

  1. How much "flying" do these guys do? On my recent NetJets flight, the copilot came back and spent 30 minutes talking with me. The pilot was monitoring the autopilot, and the autopilot flew 99% of my 4:05 flight. Pilots with hands on the controls...seeing less and less of this, and they want more money? Tough sell in my book. I know lives are at stake, but the computer has these most of the time.

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