LET THEM EAT CAKE



I remember many years ago celebrating my 10 year anniversary working for Delta Air Lines. It was a proud moment standing with the “surviving” members of my hire class that originally had stood at a little over 40.

What a great moment for me to think that I had lasted as long as I had with such fine people. It was during a period of expansion, having recently acquired Pan Am Airlines, and having served as an operations expert in Europe, during the buyout and training of remaining Pan Am workers.

Recently, I had the occasion to celebrate my 25th year of working for Delta. I was coincidentally on vacation during the festivities. I didn’t feel the same sense of pride or inclusiveness but my management team invited me, just the same, to share in the moment of that accomplishment.

I politely turned them down, but they persisted in inviting me to come, and as they said, “having your cake and eating it too!”

I found this invite to be repulsive and superficial. The invitation so much reminded me of Marie Antoinette’s “Let them eat cake” response to the starving masses of French country men just before the French Revolution. I know most historians are not in agreement, whether or not a young, Austrian Queen meant what she said or even understood the ramifications of her utterance, but history has dealt her a lasting, perhaps, unkind verdict.

I am not going to settle for cake. I and all of us deserve more. We have come too far to settle for scraps. What on earth are we celebrating? The 30 to 40% loss in pay, the near destruction of our safety net vis a vis insurance and sick leave? The dismantling of once proud hubs into such average ness that so-so effort brings us accolades?

Recently we announced a nearly 2 billion dollar 2nd quarter profit. How does an honest company, the first quarter out of bankruptcy, show such exorbitant, excessive profits while still being upfront and forthright with their employees? They don’t!

Do you think maybe we had too much taken from us? I am sure the pilots have serious questions regarding this subject. This profit should be an embarrassment to those Corporate Robber Barons who masterminded the manipulation of this workforce into believing it was our only way to salvation.

Let’s band together and take back our airline and the benefits we used to enjoy. We can do it with such ease and professionalism. It only takes a signature and a vote to regain power and dignity. I invite you to rejoin the middle class. It’s a comfortable place to reside and we all deserve it.

Union now! Support IAM and get busy taking back your airline.