March 28, 2024

On the Wings of Lead

Nov. 29, 2006
I used to love flying. There’s nothing like the adventure of stepping onto a jet and into distant places in a matter of hours. But that old thrill has been replaced by dread in recent years and the feeling that the airlines have some grand plan to screw up every flight I take.
You too?
I know this falls in the “whining” category, but given the fact that so many of us fly these days to family get-togethers, on business or vacations, it sure seems like there are some broken wings in the airline industry in need of mending.
Take our trip to Philadelphia last weekend, for instance. It was a simple trip of a
few hundred miles -- Traverse City to Detroit and then to the land of cheesesteak sandwiches. How could anyone screw that up?
Northwest Airlines provided the answer. Our flight was delayed half an hour at Cherry Capital Airport because something on the plane was broken -- I believe the pilot said it was the altimeter -- and it had to be replaced.
Right away, several people missed their connecting flights.
Then we had to sit for 45 minutes on another plane in Detroit because a replacement crew “forgot” to show up. I woke up from a nap, thinking we had landed in Philly; but in fact we were still on the runway in Detroit. Again, other people missed their connecting flights.
Just business as usual.
Then on the flight back home to Detroit, our planeload of passengers was forced to sit within a few feet of the gate for nearly 45 minutes because there was no one available to drag the plane the last little bit. And then no agent from Northwest was available to open the door from the other side. People on the plane started yelling in anger.
On our final flight back to TC, we
were again held up 30 minutes to collect the late passengers of other flights that had been held up.
Four flights out of four, all late. People missing their connections, family trips and business deals. Weekends blown, airline morale up in smoke, and perhaps millions of dollars lost by the airlines each week due to the payout of make-good flight vouchers. What a way to run a business.
In the past, I assumed that Northwest Airlines employees were sabotaging flights as part of the work slowdowns which have been used as passive-aggressive union tactics. The idea is to irritate passengers with “lost” luggage, unexpected “repairs” and delayed flights to create so many problems for management that they give in to union demands.
On this trip, however, I got the impression that Northwest simply didn’t have enough employees on the job.
Again, these are just the observations of a person with steam coming out of his ears, crammed into a sardine can full of angry travelers. I have no idea what causes Northwest Airlines’ problems -- most likely it’s the result of too many “cost saving” layoffs colliding with angry, resentful employees.
But it makes you wonder, why is America’s airline industry so ridiculously out of whack?
These days, according to an article in USA Today, most airlines pack their planes to the limit. Imagine owning a store packed each day with shoppers like it was the day after Thanksgiving -- that was the case on all four of my weekend flights. You’d think the airlines would be making enough profits to put the oil companies to shame.
But the reverse is true: Northwest,
United, Delta and their cousins always seem to be on the verge of bankruptcy, reporting billions in losses.
Funny, but you hear the same refrain coming from any number of American companies that are either dead and gone, going broke, or on the verge of extinction: KMart, Sears, the Big Three automakers, Exxon... And if you probe the business press long enough, the same culprit seems to show up again and again: bad management.

MAKING THE
CONNECTION
Recently, a Frontline PBS show focused on the end of the dream of retirement for many Americans.
Frontline noted that United Airlines declared bankruptcy to avoid paying pension benefits to employees who had worked at the company for decades. Declaring bankruptcy is a new tactic being adopted by many American corporations to skip out on their pension obligations.
God help you if you do it, though.
Like many companies, United Airlines failed to sock away the funds it promised to its employees, gambling on the stock market to pay for pensions. When the stock market fell, so too did the airlines’ pension fund.
Thus, a United Airlines flight attendant saw her pay cut by one-third, her future pension cut by one-third, and was told that henceforth, she’d be paying for much of her own health care plan to boot. Plus, there were staff cutbacks, and she was told to do more work with less help.
With that sort of disincentive being repeated at other airlines, including Northwest, it’s easy to see why the quality of air travel is declining.
Meanwhile, the wages of CEOs continue to rise as the fortunes of American workers fall. Thanks to a reader for sending in the latest on this trend:
“In 1970, notes Business Week, the CEOs of the 500 top U.S. companies took home 28 times more compensation than average American workers. These same executives are now averaging 369 times the pay of average workers. If average workers today were still earning 1/28th of what S&P 500 execs are making, their annual pay would sit at $374,800.”
Can anyone connect the dots here on the decline of the auto and aviation industries?
I wonder if those high-flying CEOs are riding coach in those tight little seats with the rest of us, sitting patiently on the runways of airports around the world? Or, are they winging their way to important meetings in private jets, planning their next brilliant move?

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