Fed Ct Overturns Tribunal Dismissal of Age 60 Complaints

[Old fella]

If you poll people in MY AGE bracket who are working and ask them would you retire now or at 60 yrs of age IF you are in a position to do so - by that I mean financial, I am sure you know that answer as well as I do.

I agree completely. In the next 30 years fewer and fewer people will be able to retire, and those that do will be worse off thanks to the growing wealth gap and disappearing pension income both government and private. Government and industry leaders who's own pensions are secure and obscenely lucrative are working overtime to deny everybody else theirs...and they're winning.

Rockie, I agree with you 150%. I shudder to think about the youngins in 20-30+ yrs as they look to the sunset on their chosen careers and they are heading in that direction. If I can part with some advice please, please put some $$ away, even if just $50.00 per month as I don't ever believe folks are gonna be able to call it quits at the magic 60 yrs of age, many are gonna have to go beyond that is for sure.

Government lucrative pensions.............. don't get me going. Just look at the latest Senate shit, some of them fly on your airline Executive class with their partners at our expense as if it their right.

[SilvrSurfr]

Another way to look at it is thus: for years, the career salary income expectations of junior pilots were artificially inflated upwards strictly by reason of age discrimination. Removing age discrimination put them back to where they would have been, without age discrimination.

Raymond,

I am a little confused by part of your argument. This statement above doesn't deny impact to junior people. Rather it embraces the impact but justify's it by way of ending age discrimination. That junior people have lost nothing with the change. Prior to this junior pilots were taking what belonged to people over 60.

I understand the arguement but having trouble with the logic and how it applies here to the math.

On one hand I hear flat out denial that junior pilots will make less as a result of the change to mandatory retirement. On the other hand it is flat out acknowledged and then justified by yourself.

So which is it? Is your position this change has no impact on junior pilots? Or is your position yes there is impact but it is justified?

It can't be both? Can it?

The confusing part of this thread for me, is the vehement denial of impact to junior pilots by all FP60 supporters except for you?

After a little bit of scratching my head I think I figured it out. Is it the arguement that pilot wages and progression were artificially increased as a result of illegal mandatory retirement? By removing that "false" progression the impact disappears?

That is the only way I can figure out how to justify logic that on the surface seems to contradict real world math.

You would therefor be arguing that the charts showing pilot wage impact as in error because they make the false assumption the wage and progression belonged to those pilots. Where in fact it didn't belong to those pilots. In fact it was stolen from post 60 pilots by way of an illegal practice called mandatory retirement.

So your not arguing the impact charts are mathimatically in error. You are arguing it was charted on the false assumption that progression belonged to these individuals. After removing the "false" assumption the charts naturally become flat. Zero impact.

Why didn't someone just tell me that 2 pages ago!

Exactly Fanblade,

It's like I said in my post to these guys earlier. Go ahead and enjoy your winnings. Just stop telling me how good it is for me and others when the situation clearly shows this is not the case.

Surfr

[Raymond Hall]

So your not arguing the impact charts are mathimatically in error. You are arguing it was charted on the false assumption that progression belonged to these individuals.

Let me first clarify something about my participation here. I am not here to "argue" anything. Long ago I stated that my participation here was simply to provide facts, not argument. I may have strayed slightly in recent posts by providing some opinions in addition to facts. But those opinions are only coincidental, not argumentative, I trust, based on observations of the facts.

I have never disagreed that change, such as the removal of mandatory retirement, will have an adverse differential impact on the interests of different individuals. Change implies impact--differential impact. That should be obvious. I have suggested that change is inevitable, and that we should not only anticipate it, but embrace it, to our advantage.

The union's opinion evidence submitted to the Tribunal was openly stated to be based on an assumption that 100% of pilots would remain employed after age 60 to age 63. The facts that you present regarding the actual numbers go further--they indicate that the union's evidentiary assumptions were unfounded.

The union's evidentiary submissions were also based on the assumption that mandatory retirement would remain in place for over 30 years. That assumption, in hindsight, was also unfounded. So what value, then, was that opinion evidence, to the situation facing the Tribunal in November, 2009, when it was deposed, or to the courts today reviewing the Tribunal's deliberation of that evidence?

What we are left with, in my view, is a largely academic discussion. Nothing more. The facts and the law have superseded any of our previous expectations, real, hypothetical or otherwise.

[Rockie]

ACPA's financial impact study was also based on every pilot on the list moving up to the next higher paying position they could hold the minute they were able to hold it, and the numbers were recalculated top to bottom with every single retirement.

We all know only a small fraction of pilots actually do that, so that one error in assumptions alone renders that study a baseless piece of fiction.

[Stu Pidasso]

Mack The Knife; what a load of BS. The thousand (or so) Pilots that honorably retired during your tenure, yes the ones that allowed you to advance up the seniority list, were also "dirty rags."

Furthermore, ACPA did not throw indexation "under the bus," it was STOLEN from us by an Arbitrator.

[Rockie]

Mack The Knife; what a load of BS. The thousand (or so) Pilots that honorably retired during your tenure, yes the ones that allowed you to advance up the seniority list, were also "dirty rags."

Correction - they retired because they had no choice. Honour had nothing to do with it.

[Stu Pidasso]

Most of the retirees that I have had the pleasure of knowing, were happy to hang-it-up. The exception being the ones living in a basement suite after wife number three cleaned them out.

Here is an open invitation to all the "dirty rags;" T4's should be out soon. How about you post your pension income and we'll compare it to what a 767 CAPTAIN now earns at Little Red, flying to the CARS limits?

There have been a few changes while you were down at the trailer park in Arizona.

[Fanblade]

ACPA's financial impact study was also based on every pilot on the list moving up to the next higher paying position they could hold the minute they were able to hold it, and the numbers were recalculated top to bottom with every single retirement.

We all know only a small fraction of pilots actually do that, so that one error in assumptions alone renders that study a baseless piece of fiction.

False.........yet......Again.

It paints a macro picture. That's it. It is not meant to be 100% unequivocally correct. You would need a fortune teller for that. If one person moves later and another earlier redistribution of the pool of payroll will change from a micro point of view. From a Macro view little to nothing changes.

Why are you so fearful of the validity of this concept? Even Raymond conceeds that the before and after snap shot of payroll and career progression shows impact. He at least has an explanation to try and justify why that impact isn't real. He does it this way. " for years, the career salary income expectations of junior pilots were artificially inflated upwards strictly by reason of age discrimination"

Are you getting the difference yet? This is your FP60 position. Bizarre that I have to explain it to you. You acknowledge career and payroll progression will reduce as a result on mandatory retirement ending. What you saying is that does not constitute harm to junior members. Rather pay and progression were artificially increased with the use of mandatory retirement. Since the before snap shot was artificially increased and the after snap shot only returns progression to normal? Zero impact.

This is how both the statements I and Raymond made are both correct.

From a before and after snap shot.

Fanblade: From here on out people will work longer for the same or less as a result of the end of mandatory retirement. I claim this to be impact.

Raymond: The impact I claim is not real as it is based on an illegal mechanism to generate higher lifetime pay and progression.

Notice very closely here. Raymond's position reinforces the position that mandatory retirement DOES increase lifetime compensation. He is claiming it was unlawful way to get it.

Stop telling people the change allows people to make more lifetime income. It doesn't.

[accumulous]

ACPA's financial impact study was also based on every pilot on the list moving up to the next higher paying position they could hold the minute they were able to hold it, and the numbers were recalculated top to bottom with every single retirement.

We all know only a small fraction of pilots actually do that, so that one error in assumptions alone renders that study a baseless piece of fiction.

You are so completely correct with the exception that it goes way, way beyond being a baseless piece of fiction.

It violates every law of statistical analysis. It is 'built' to a junior pilot agenda and everybody knows what that agenda is. All the examples of falsified 'data' are one thing but when you apply those obvious gross errors to an agenda it all becomes so utterly transparent it's really hard to tell if you're dreaming or not.

As was mentioned several times above, if you apply any kind of validity test to the mathematical mess and the agenda it tries to support, in any real academic setting, the authors would just simply be asked to leave the room. People here are talking about nuts and chipmunks and completely erroneous constructs like pools of income that don't even exist in an open ended career across demographics, if it wasn't all just plain pathetic it would be funny. All the attempts by the agenda to hide all the nuts at the top of the tree only really point out what chipmunks always do, and that is to hide their nuts.

The best solution is to just sit back and watch the Nut Theory of Mathematics unfold in all its glory and then at the appropriate time drop the real document on the table and just expose all the nuts.

[777longhaul]

A few important points to remember:

The FP60 have not returned to the nut tree. They are still fighting for their rights, in the courts, so nuts that have been consumed, taken, redistributed what ever......must be taken by someone else, who, must still be at the airline, and are still acpa members in good standing, and who are legally in their positions, what ever position that might be. So, take a look around you, and figure out who is doing that. It is not the FP 60 group, none of them are back at AC. Dont worry, acpa has your back, so relax a little, polish your nuts, and hide them away.

The age 60 rule was changed by the Federal Government, not the FP60 group. So....if your nuts are not where you want them to be, or think they should be, or fantasize where they should, might be, could be, remember that it is acpa that has brought the lower pay scales, the current contract, etc etc. The perceived loss of nuts, is just that, perceived.....any pilot, can make a choice to gather more nuts, eat what he/she has, or take them and run.

The only reason, the only reason, the Federal Government changed the age rule, was......it was discriminatory, period. They did not change the law, that affected, over 800,000 workers in Canada because they wanted to change the nuts on the tree, or that might, have fallen into the pool. The law was discriminatory, and the only way, AC and acpa, could legally attempt to force pilots to retire, was to qualify for BFOR, and NAR. (Bona Fide Occupational Requirement, and Normal Age of Retirement.) The courts have said that they do, and they don't. So.....it's still up to the courts to make the final decision on BFOR and NAR.

The mess, of low cost, the loss of jobs potential, (perceived) and the lower expectations of those that think discrimination is ok, are just using, and listening, and believing in acpa speak. The law, will decide.

For now, all the nuts, are just where they should be.

The FP60 are aprx. 200 pilots out of 3000. Do the nut math, figure out the percentage, then subtract the ones that are over 65, and you will get the picture. The FP60 group are not your true nut problem. The age 60 rule changed, your nuts are safe, and they will always be hanging in there, so that you can gather all the nuts when you want to, nice choice to have.

[Rockie]

All this talk about nuts is making me hungry.

[Fanblade]

Sorry thought I was conversing with educated professionals.

As you were.

[Rockie]

Did the FP60 guys steal your sense of humour too?

[MackTheKnife]

Mack The Knife; what a load of BS. The thousand (or so) Pilots that honorably retired during your tenure, yes the ones that allowed you to advance up the seniority list, were also "dirty rags."

Furthermore, ACPA did not throw indexation "under the bus," it was STOLEN from us by an Arbitrator.

As Rocky points out, they retired because they had no choice BUT to retire. I flew with numerous pilots on their last flights and I can honestly say I did not hear one of them rejoicing in their forced banishment. It was more of reluctant acceptance. Thanks to the FP60 group you will have a choice and IMO every pilot in ACPA owes Ray and his group a huge debt of gratitude for dragging the profession into the 21st century.

ACPA did indeed throw indexation under the bus because they were too afraid of their own shadow to fight for it, (probably because the change didn't immediately affect the current head shed in ACPA.)

History has since proven the mediator was full of BS in his reasoning that re-instating indexation would cause undue hardship on AC's recovery.

[777longhaul]

Indexing of the pension, well yes, acpa, did throw it under the bus. Stanley was the end result.

I had an MEC member, tell me to my face, as I was bitching about the indexing etc, that the younger pilots at acpa mec did not need the indexing at their stage in life.....they did not require it, and they fully expected to be able to renegotiate the indexing back in, over the next 10 years. The cost savings by getting rid of the indexing was to be applied to the contract. It wasn't. The indexing was gone, maybe forever, and acpa, yet fing again, screwed it up for everyone. acpa threw the indexing up on the table, and from there.....it went totally under the bus, it was their move period.

[Sea2Sky]

I flew with numerous pilots on their last flights and I can honestly say I did not hear one of them rejoicing in their forced banishment. It was more of reluctant acceptance. Thanks to the FP60 group you will have a choice and IMO every pilot in ACPA owes Ray and his group a huge debt of gratitude for dragging the profession into the 21st century.

I'll bet many of them rejoiced as they bid into better seats, money, and quality of life at a time they could enjoy it all, though. So thanks for the choice: to enjoy the same relative career progression, I'll get to stagnate in my seat for an extra five years. What a bunch of heroes. Cheers!

[MackTheKnife]

I'll bet many of them rejoiced as they bid into better seats, money, and quality of life at a time they could enjoy it all, though. So thanks for the choice: to enjoy the same relative career progression, I'll get to stagnate in my seat for an extra five years. What a bunch of heroes. Cheers!

Sea2Sky,

Let me guess, you were probably hired directly into the airline as an FO, maybe even a Capt and you are all worried about your career progression.

Until you have spent anywhere from 5-15 years as a Second Officer watching others do the job you would have sold your soul for, you cant even begin to know the true meaning of the word stagnate. If indeed you actually do experience any appreciable stagnation, (which I highly doubt you will) at least be thankful for the fact you are actually flying and making a great wage while the transition occurs.

Every one focuses on the one guy who was hired in diapers and had a 45 year career who wanted to continue past 60. Thats the same as Joe Blow public thinking all pilots make a 747 Captains wage when the reality as you well know is totally the opposite.

I would venture a guess to say the demographics for the majority of FP60 complainants probably had their flying careers shortened by at least 1/4 to 1/3 sitting whiling away their time in the back seat longing for the job you were hired right off the street to do.

[Rockie]

Sea2Sky

You have never been and will never be owed a career or a set rate of progression in it. You already have the kind of career many people can only dream of except now you can end it when you choose instead of being forced out against your will at an arbitrary age not of your choosing.

Please stop being such a self-indulgent crybaby and consider yourself extremely fortunate to be where you are.

[Dockjock]

Hey fellas who sat in the back seat...if it wasn't for that seat, you wouldn't have even been hired. Ever think of that? When aircraft went to two pilots 20 years ago (or more), 33% of airline jobs disappeared. In the meantime, you build YOS, while pilots now work for regionals or worse until they can touch a 93-seat jet as FO. If you think today's new pilots have a cakewalk, there really is no point discussing anything because you're head is so far up your own butt...

[Sea2Sky]

Self-indulgent? Lol... pot calling the kettle black, methinks. It's not I who thinks they're owed something.

If you're going to give a history lesson on hiring practices from back in the day, remind yourself how many were hired to the airline straight out of flight school. What's the average age now? It took me 10 years to get here when I did; how many civilian pilots (ex-military excluded, and thank you for your service) had to do the same back then? How many hit their 12 year salary max before 40? And how many RPs, for example, enjoyed salaries higher than current 5 year FOs?

I have yet to meet one person in that age range who describes the lifestyle back then as worse than it is for new hires right now. Please don't sell the hard lifestyle sob story to people who--yes--entered at the right seat, but did so at a comparatively MUCH lower wage. Sure, everybody know what the deal is for the first few years. But so did these guys who are staying.

My issue, sir, is not about what is owed. My issue is with the hypocrisy of greed hiding behind the cloak of altruism. Emperor's clothes, my friend. I didn't see anybody challenging this when it was their career progression that benefitted from the contract.

Mack, you have some valid points. But I dare say the stagnation period will not be minimal. While many did stagnate in the past, economic downturns, catastrophic events, and the merger played a significant role there, not guys lingering at the top when it was their turn to deplane.

[Rockie]

Sea2sky

Not only will my career be just as stagnated as yours, but it's a certainty that yours will be a lot longer than mine here at Air Canada. The difference between us is that I think mandatory retirement is discriminatory and it was destined to end (as it did), and that trying to fight the inevitable was a foolish pointless waste of time and resources (it was). I wanted the pilots to think with their heads instead of their wallets and without their eye fixated on the next upgrade. You still seem unable to do that.

You continue to demonstrate the same critical shortsightedness that is the root of all our pilot group's problems.

[sidestick stirrer]

Well, even with mandatory retirement at sixty and my bidding Captain slots to the bottom, I rode side-saddle or right seat for twenty-two years at Big Red before moving across the pedestal. It was not considered career stagnation and I never, ever, resented any Captain staying until mandatory retirement. Nor can I imagine now resenting any who choose to stay longer.
Perhaps some folks' careers to this point have had a lot of grasping and scrabbling to get to where they are. Or they are of the "instant gratification" generation...
As for taking a pay cut upon starting at ACA, I can only recall four of us new hires with our big brain bags, sharing a rented, air-cooled Volkswagen Beetle to get between our accommodations( which we had to pay for, no per diems) and the Training Centre. It was all that we could afford to do.
In Montreal.
In the Winter...

[Martin Tamme]

I had an MEC member, tell me to my face, as I was bitching about the indexing etc, that the younger pilots at acpa mec did not need the indexing at their stage in life.....they did not require it, and they fully expected to be able to renegotiate the indexing back in, over the next 10 years.

As as sitting MEC member at the time, I have to call bullshit to that statement. Even if it were true, do you believe for one minute that Kent Wilson -ACPA President- who was within a couple of month from retirement himself would have allowed that to happen?

We lost it plain & simple because the ACPA Negotiations Committee, which was assisted by the Pension Committee were unable to convince Stanley otherwise. Why Stanley was on ACPA's list of sought Arbitrators for the FOS is beyond me. If they couldn't convince him in 2006, what made them believe they could in 2012?

[accumulous]

I had an MEC member, tell me to my face, as I was bitching about the indexing etc, that the younger pilots at acpa mec did not need the indexing at their stage in life.....they did not require it, and they fully expected to be able to renegotiate the indexing back in, over the next 10 years.

As as sitting MEC member at the time, I have to call bullshit to that statement. Even if it were true, do you believe for one minute that Kent Wilson -ACPA President- who was within a couple of month from retirement himself would have allowed that to happen?

We lost it plain & simple because the ACPA Negotiations Committee, which was assisted by the Pension Committee (which included Craig Blandford & Kent Wilson) were unable to convince Stanley otherwise. Why Stanley was on ACPA's list of sought Arbitrators for the FOS is beyond me. If they couldn't convince him in 2006, what made them believe they could in 2012?

What? ACPA couldn't have convinced any Arbitrator of anything. As has often been pointed out, AC plays chess, and ACPA plays checkers. In FOS, ACPA proposed pulling all the Captains out of their left seats at age 60 and sticking them in the right seat at Captain pay rates, which had to be one of the most inept moves ever put on paper by any Union. It wouldn't have mattered who the Arbitrator was. It was a crystal clear fully documented case of age discrimination.

[777longhaul]

call it what ever you want, I am saying what was told to me, first hand by an acpa rep. The aprx savings were projected to be around 26 million.

Was indexing on the actual list for the first round on negotiations, with Stanley? The way it was told to me, was the list did not contain the indexing, and acpa offered it up, late in the proceedings. Is that not true? Can you see the first list, before the final list?

How is it that the airline could not afford to have indexing, for the retired pilots, and the soon to be retired pilots, when AC can afford to have management on it? The sell job to Stanley was what?

I do agree, that having Stanley on the list for 2012 was just unbelievable. He stated that his understanding of our pension was, that it was very generous, and we did not need indexing. Wonder who shoved that idea up his ass. AC played the game very well, again. The entire pilot group got screwed, big time on that one.