Airlines

Category Archives for Airlines.

You Can Now Install Your Own Stained Glass Window Next To Your Airplane Seat

by Gary Leff

Mar 19 2020

Real customers have come up with inventions to improve the inflight experience. They’re not always uncontroversial. The knee defender keeps the passenger in front of you from reclining but has also led to conflicts. Less so the armrest splitter or the spAIRtray which gives you a little ledge beside the window seat that you install in the aircraft window.

Now comes a new innovation truly for our times: a stick on, peel off faux stained glass window to create ambiance in the cabin, help you pray, and stand between you and germs on the window.

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American Airlines President Robert Isom Says No Bailout Needed, Will Take The Money Anyway

by Gary Leff

Mar 19 2020

In London just in advance of travel restrictions going into effect, American Airlines President Robert Isom traveled across the Pond to speak to employees there. American employees nearly 1000 people in the U.K.

He spoke at the British Airways headquarters at Waterside, and said that while they aren’t going to spend “even a dollar” that they do not have to, they owe it to customers not to degrade the inflight experience and that the company is “prepared to weather any type of storms that come up and says there’s “enough cash on hand to weather downturns in the business.” And that was before they picked up another billion dollars just today. Still they want to ensure that if the government is handing out money, they’re well-positioned to get some.

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Crazy Times Bring Out Dumb Ideas, and Nationalizing Airlines Is The Worst

by Gary Leff

Mar 18 2020

Former White House Chief of Staff and former Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel is known for saying ‘never let a crisis go to waste.’ It’s an opportunity to push an agenda. So as the airline bailout train leaves the station some people are advocating the consumer protection rules that they wanted anyway. Others (like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) want the financial reforms they want anyway.

If you hate air travel you want to use this crisis to nationalize the airlines, an idea put forward by the left wing American Prospect.

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Don’t Ban Stock Buybacks Or Impose Consumer Protection Rules As Part Of An Airline Bailout

by Gary Leff

cash
Mar 18 2020

Airline bailouts are a bad idea. Stockholders should take a haircut before taxpayers. Airline bankruptcy does not present contagion risk to the economy. Airlines have flown through bankruptcy successfully – American, Delta, and United have all done it. And any help for workers should address the needs people face independent of industry.. Working for an airline isn’t ‘more special’ than some other job.

However there are very bad ideas circulating around new conditions to impose in exchange for a bailout.

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United Has Cut So Much Flying It’s Easier To List The Flights They Run Than Those They Don’t

by Gary Leff

united plane
Mar 18 2020

United’s April flight schedule is down 60% year-over-year; an 85% decrease for international (and greater than that for transatlantic and transpacific) and a 42% for U.S. and Canada flying.

It’s easier to list the international flights that are actually operating than those that aren’t. Domestically there are a lot of cuts but United emphasizes they’ve only completed stopped flying to one U.S. airport

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American Airlines Asks Flight Attendants To Take Leave With No Pay

by Gary Leff

Mar 17 2020

American Airlines is telling flight attendants they have “great options” to choose from to voluntarily reduce the airline’s workforce: retirement and no pay but two years of benefits, or leave with no pay but benefits. Pilots are being offered about two-thirds of pay.

Unless there’s some sort of commitment not to furlough employees as part of taking the government bailout package airline CEOs and their lobbyists have been pushing for, I’d expect to see furloughs coming next.

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What Should Flight Attendants Be Doing To Stay Safe?

by Gary Leff

Mar 17 2020

Most coverage has been about passengers – being afraid to fly, not allowed to fly by their companies, being advised to avoid risk. The President of the United States is advising against discretionary travel that is still mostly permitted. Yet day in and day out airline crew continue to show up at airports, get on planes, and interact with passengers. They’ve continued to work flights to Europe and Asia that many passengers have been unwilling to take.

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